I know we already have a notify thingy by email, but I think it would also be convenient to have like a little red envelope thing appear by the _ are new thing that would be there if you have new messages. I say this because sometimes I have like 3 new messages but I dont notice it because I dont look at the top part of the forum thing often, but if I see some brightly colored thing up there that normally isn't, it would get my attention.
