Welcome to the new Engadget commenting system, Livefyre

Greetings readers and commenters. We here at Engadget are always working hard to provide you with the best reading experience we possibly can. To do this, we're making a clean break from our old commenting system -- starting anew in the interests of elevating the discourse that occurs in our comments. Yes, we know that change can be inconvenient at best and scary at worst, but fear not, dear readers, for Livefyre is here to improve your Engadget commenting experience. All you have to do is create a Livefyre account or login using your existing Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn or OpenID credentials. And before you ask, no, your Disqus account cannot be ported to the new system. Everyone needs a fresh start sometimes, okay? This is one of those times. Eager to learn more? Want to help make our comments better? The answers you seek are after the break.

Why the change? Well, the web's getting more social, and folks are sharing their gadget-y thoughts and witty comments on social networks and in our comments every day. With Livefyre's friend tagging feature, you can post your thoughts on an article and invite your friends on Twitter and Facebook right from LF's commenting system. Not only that, should you find a particularly profound or funny comment (we encourage both, assuming you obey the rules), posting it on social networks is merely a click away. Aside from the social benefits, Livefyre also lets you change the look of comments themselves with a rich text editor. That means bold, italics, underlines, even numbered and bullet point lists are now at your command.

The goodies don't stop there, either. You see, not only does Livefyre give you an improved commenting experience, it gives us more powerful moderation tools with which to keep the riff raff out, and meaningful discussion in. And our editors and mods will be redoubling their efforts to keep Engadget's comments clean. In fact, we're looking to add to our moderator ranks to make it happen. So, if you think you're up to the task, send us an email at jobsATengadgetDOTcom with the phrase "Comment Moderator" (no quotes) in the subject with the following:

• Your name, location, and a few words about yourself.

• Your contact info, including your Livefyre handle and any IM accounts you still use.

• What times of the day you're likely to be available for moderation.

• An answer to the following: Why would you be the best comment moderator ever?

• Any other questions you might have.

Please note that moderation positions are unpaid and if you don't submit the above you're pretty well taking yourself out of the running.

While we hope that the change over will go off without a hitch, we know that in the course of such an overhaul glitches may pop up. If something seems amiss with any of the comments, just shoot a tweet to @engadgetsupport or comment on this here post and we'll see that it gets corrected. Engadget's a community, and we think that Livefyre will make that community better than ever.

We hope you're as excited about the new system as we are, and we'll see you in the comments.

Update: A few notes now that we're live...

• If the refreshing is driving you mad, select to view posts by "Oldest" first if you don't want 'em to refresh up top.

• Edit your profile if you'd prefer to lessen or eliminate Like / reply notifications.

• A bunch of you have requested the ability to sort by most popular. Livefyre is working on it.

• There are currently some issues about disabling emails in your profile. The Livefyre team is aware and working on a fix.

• We know, this is quite a change, but trust us, the extra moderation tools on the back-end will mean a happier, cleaner comments section going forward!