That’s odd. It should be after the “Default Thread Subscription Mode” box, and above the “Visitor Messaging” sub-section.
I see that you just recently registered. Maybe there is a probationary period where the Private Messaging feature is not available for your first week or month on the forum. This could be an anti-spammer tactic.
I read that in the past, email addresses posted on public forums were a more important way of obtaining addresses for spammers. But in recent years, with the massive data breaches at so many large companies (Target, Home Depot, Morgan Stanley, etc.), spammers have better ways of harvesting email addresses from the majority of American consumers.
You could also disguise your email address, using the letters “AT” in place of the @ sign. Most of the emails taken from forums and websites are harvested by automated web crawlers, not by humans reading through all the forums and websites out there. You can leave out the .com part too, or alter other recognizable parts of the address.
Some examples:
person AT gmail
person AT g mail
person AT g mail DOT com
User name: person
Email service: g mail
.
Sorry If im missing something obvious.
