The reason I can do it is because I have a little system-tray icon that notifies me when a new post appears on the BBS. I treat it more or less like e-mail or instant messenging. I do my work all day in multiple windows on my desktop and I'm constantly answering emails anyway, so for any given BBS post, it's really only a slight diversion to read and optionally reply to any messages. I find that it takes very little time to keep things caught up during the day.

As for coming in first thing in the morning, I've got it down to a science where I can rip through all the new BBS posts in about 10 minutes. It only becomes a problem after I've just come back from a vacation.