I visit another forum (one about mangas and Japanese stuff) which apparently uses the same basic software as this board, but it has the attractive feature that if you are logged in, when you click on a topic title, it takes you right to the first unread message, instead of the first message (as this board does). I have long understood that if you click on the white square after the last poster's name, you will go to the last message. But I didn't know how to get to the first UNREAD message. If you don't already realize it -- there is a way.
That symbol on the left which is red if there are unread messages and black if there aren't (and showing a dot if you've posted in the thread) -- immediately to the right of THAT (and to the left of the topic title) there is another square, and if you click on THAT you go to the first unread message.
I know this isn't about cooking, but this is the forum I read the most. If you think it's useful you can copy it elsewhere. Possibly everyone here knew this except me...