The quick summary of thread origin and posting history, including top users and their post-counts (as well as links) has been an eye-opener for me. I know it’s been around for a while, but it’s at the top of the thread, and I usually view the bottom of a thread that I’m participating in – since I’m reading new posts.
Well, we view it as the “table of contents” for the topic, which is the front of a book. Or, if you prefer, It’s like the map you hand out to visitors when they enter Disneyland – it’s positioned near the entrance for new visitors to get their bearings.
In addition to the cast of characters, other stuff that is there:
top clicked links in the topic, with domain sources
button to summarize the topic to generate the “Reader’s Digest Condensed Version” of the topic
