Robert, thank you for bringing up your concerns.
When I decided to code my own solution (since none of the existing ones work atm), I didn’t know about the pros and cons of theme components vs plugins. It would be great if the how-to on plugin development contained a disclaimer, maybe? (Developing Discourse Plugins - Part 1 - Create a basic plugin)
I really just needed a simple solution to facilitate the audio recording workflow. If you, as a veteran in this space, feel inspired to transform the plugin into a theme component, I’d be happy to assist you and answer questions about the source code of the plugin.
If you don’t, I might be able to come back to this eventually, I just can’t say when I’ll have the time 