@myk505: There were always ads on the left side of the screen.
@[[john]]: The signatures are currently limited right now in length (paying or otherwise). I am sure someone will complain but it is pretty liberal, you can get probably 5 lines of text in there.
All of the credit for the logo goes to the one and only J. Filipow, who was kind enough to design it for me and give me some direction on the rest of the look. I'm sure I didn't do him justice with the rest of the rather plain design.