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By now, you've probably noticed our new profile system that rolled out earlier in the summer. In the system, people who comment on LAist are segregated into two groups: those who have registered for a free account to leave a comment (who have their name attached to each comment) and those who haven't (who are universally called "guest"). As of this morning, LAist's publisher Gothamist has rolled out another change, whereby guest comments are automatically not displayed for all users. They are not gone forever, indeed to display them, all you have to do is click "Show Guest Comments" below any post to display them, and a cookie will be set on your computer to always display them.
That small change is the next step in a slow phasing-out of anonymous comments here on LAist. Soon, guest comments will be disabled altogether and the only people who will be able to comment on LAist will be those who have signed up for a free account. This is a natural and necessary step forward, and, really, it takes like ten seconds to register, it's free, and anyone can do it. Please do sign up if you haven't yet.
If you're a registered commenter, you'll also see something new when you click "Edit Profile" in the top left corner: you can now upload a 100 x 100 avatar. For now, that icon will only be displayed on your profile, but soon it'll be used to identify you in the comments for an article.
LAist provides its readers with over 20 posts a day about music in LA, food, current events, politics, sports, technology, art, traffic, housing, neighborhoods, and so many facets to living in this great town. Our writers volunteer their time to go to neighborhood council meetings, protests, restaurants, concerts, community events, and quite frankly deserve the respect that many registered commentors give them.
If you are attached to the idea of being able to be a negative anonymous commentor, however, you will soon have to do that somewhere else. But have no fear, the blogosphere has 88 million blogs. If you need to get your anonymous fix, you have a wide variety of other places to haunt.
For the rest of you, if you have always needed an excuse to spend a few seconds to register, we hope that this provides that excuse for you. We do want to hear what you think. Even if it's negative, and even if it's positive. Remember, if you don't tell us when we're being good, who will?
If you have any questions or concerns feel free to drop me an email at tony @ laist
Original photo by dviousto from the Torontoist Flickr Pool.
