Also, if you click on someone else’s name, that is, so you can see a different person’s profile, then there will be a direct link available to message them. But, again, unless they’re actively checking, I don’t think they’ll have any obvious way to know that a message was sent to them.
EDIT: when I said there’s no direct link, I meant “there’s no obvious simple path from just clicking stuff on the front page of LW to get to your inbox”
There actually is a private messaging thing built into LW, but it’s not obvious, and there’s no direct link to see incoming messages.
go to http://lesswrong.com/message/inbox to see your inbox (which includes replies to your comments).
Also, if you click on someone else’s name, that is, so you can see a different person’s profile, then there will be a direct link available to message them. But, again, unless they’re actively checking, I don’t think they’ll have any obvious way to know that a message was sent to them.
EDIT: when I said there’s no direct link, I meant “there’s no obvious simple path from just clicking stuff on the front page of LW to get to your inbox”