At Disqus, we know that people choose to express themselves freely and openly in online communities. They can choose what they want to say, where they want to say it and how they choose to identify themselves when they do. And many of the people who use Disqus do this under a pseudonym — a handle or nickname that isn’t the person’s actual name.

"I can see why a site like Re/Code might drop comments. You can't just add comments and expect a community to emerge.

Henry Anatole Grunwald, long-time editor of TIME, once said, “Journalism can never be silent: That is its greatest virtue and its greatest fault. It must speak, and speak immediately, while the echoes of wonder, the claims of triumph and the signs of horror are still in the air.” In today’s ever-connected world, people of all colors, stripes and backgrounds are now part of that journalistic struggle — they share stories, provide commentary and are just as part of the news as the sources, writers, and editors.

Every day, people who use Disqus generate more than 7,000 hours of conversation across any number of topics imaginable. Movies are among the most popular drivers of discussion. Of course, this shouldn’t come as a surprise because who doesn’t love debating the merits of a particular film or actor’s performance, or searching for deeper meaning from movies they’ve seen (Ron Burgundy is a metaphor for post-Cold War America success in spite of itself…think about it).

A safe environment for women seems like an anomaly on the Internet these days, but at The Mary Sue, the community of readers is showing us how it’s done. One of those readers is JustPlainSomething, a regular commenter who geeks out about nerd culture with a healthy dose of comics, movies, television, and games. An unabashed feminist, she is representative of the type of inclusive environment for women that The Mary Sue cultivates every day. She also deserves serious Internet points when one of her comments spontaneously sparked a meme that the TMS community quickly adopted with fervent enthusiasm. More on that later.

In July, we started a series called Life At Disqus. Inspired by Humans of New York, this project aimed to share the story of Disqus through the people who work here. Every week, we introduced a new Disqusser, sharing insights into their passions, hobbies and aspirations. During the course of running Life at Disqus, I was reminded of one important fact: technology isn’t what makes communities so special - it’s the people. We’re a team of geeks, mavericks, and quirky characters passionate about what we do, just like the types of eccentric and tight-knit communities we hope to foster every day through the products we build. I hope you enjoyed following along as much I did being able to bring these stories to life. Here now is a recap including some extra tidbits we didn’t publish the first time around.

Disqus makes it easy for people to add color to content across 3 million websites around the world. And each day, millions of users contribute through comments, replies, upvotes and follows about thousands of topics and interests. Today, we’re announcing new features and changes to our notifications that make it easier for people to track their conversations and better engage with site content on an ongoing basis. Here’s a breakdown of what you’ll start seeing this week.

As a community leader for your site, you’re probably interested in building an audience. If you often find yourself sitting on the sidelines, twiddling your thumbs waiting for this to occur, we’ve got some tips for you: get commenting! Jump into the comment section and reply directly to your community members. After all, you’re an important member of, well, your community and your contributions matter. We recently chatted with Nikki Parkinson over at Styling You, who runs a very loyal and active Fashion and Style community. We wanted to pick her brain on the topic of author participation.

We're in the midst of another exciting movie season this summer, with surprise hits like The Guardians of the Galaxy and Boyhood. At Badass Digest, you'll find a community of passionate movie junkies obsessing over the latest box office or movie trailer releases, delving into pop culture, cult classics, and more.

Y’all know that Disqus is known as the web’s “community of communities”. Our product allows people all over the Internet to discuss their interests and engage in conversations with people who share (or hey, don’t share) their passions…people they’ve never met, and may never meet. This is one of the most exciting things about the Internet, and it’s what I love about blogging and social media.

It's like 10:30 pm and I'm still in the office.