A Note to Lurkers

Do you read Bloody Elbow, but aren't a member?  No problem, that's cool.  But there's more to being a member than commenting, and it's surprisingly easy to sign up, since we accept already-existing Yahoo IDs and Open IDs.  What are those additional benefits?

• The number of new comments for front page Stories (and Fanshots and Fanposts) is listed next to the number of total comments on the front page.  You'll always know when there's something added to the discussion without having to remember how many total comments there were last time you visited.
• When you're on a post page, new comments have a slightly yellow background and you can easily jump to new comments by hitting the "z" key.  You'll never have to scroll looking for new comments again.  Plus, new comments are added live, so there's no reason to refresh pages.This is especially helpful during our live blogs and round by round coverage.
  
• If you are a member of multiple SBN blogs, there is a drop-down menu at the top of the screen that lists all your blogs and how many new Stories, FanPosts, and FanShots have been posted since the last time you visited each blog.  You can even select some blogs as favorites and they'll show up at the top of your list.

If you do decide to create an account and post a few comments, there are some additional nifty tools to help keep you organized.

• By going to your profile page (click on your name at the top of the screen) you can see the last fifty or so comments you've left across all SBN blogs and how many replies there to your comment.  It's a great way to keep track of conversations you've recently been a part of.
• Also on your profile page, you can click on Blog to see all the Stories, FanShots, and FanPosts you've posted across all SBN blogs.  This is handy for looking at other users' Blogs as well, if you're a fan of their work.  You can even RSS their stuff across all blogs in one feed.  This feature is useful even if you're not a member.

(Hat tip to Sky Kalkman, who originally wrote this for Beyond the Boxscore.)

UPDATE: here's a few more perks to signing up that the original entry didn't mention:

• By clicking "Edit Settings" You can change the default number of Front Page News, Fanposts and Fanshots to as high as 50 from the default 10. BloodyElbow.com provides a ton of news everyday and by increasing the number of news to be displayed, you can see the posts that you otherwise would have missed had you stayed with the normal 10 posts. This also makes it easier to keep track of conversations and new comments in the past posts.
  
• The view can be set to "Wide" by default. It makes it easier to read the longer articles.
• Pressing "Shift-A" marks all comments as read. Also a very useful tool especially during live blogs where there are tons of people commenting.