I definitely want this.

I've been using `<sup>\*</sup>` and `<sup>\*\*</sup>` and so on in the text and a `---` rule followed by `<sub>\*</sub>` at the end, and it sort of works, but:

 * I want the footnotes to be smaller/less important-looking, but on many browsers, subscript text is _too_ small, as [Eugene Siedel's answer](https://meta.stackexchange.com/a/187975/230882) shows.
 * This is clearly an abuse of `<sub>`'s semantic meaning.
 * `<sub>` doesn't work in combination with some other kinds of formatting. Part of the reason I use asterisks instead of numbered footnotes is to remind myself that auto-numbered lists and `<sub>` don't work together.
 * `<sub>` _does_ work with `embedded code`, but it looks ugly on most browsers.<sup>\*</sup> And that _definitely_ affects SO. I have brief bits of code in my footnotes all the time.
 * It would be much nicer for the reader if the footnotes were hyperlinked. (I know, I shouldn't be writing answers so long that it really matters. But the time I would spend editing one of them down, I could write book-sized answers on three other interesting questions I've found. :)
 * I frequently screw up the number of asterisks, which is one of the reasons I end up re-editing my answers too often and annoying other people.
 * I still catch myself using the years-obsolete `<super>` instead of the HTML5 `<sup>` tag, although that's probably just a problem with me. But it's kind of annoying that it actually works on some browsers, so I don't always notice it…

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<sub>\* How does this look for you? In particular, does the embedded code cause the lines to be spaced for full-sized text, even though the `embedded code`, like the rest of the text, is not full-sized?</sub>