The new navbar, with its Follow and Share links, has been out for just over a week. People are starting to use the Follow button, instead of the Followers gadget - which is not necessarily present on every blog. But there are differences between the "Follow" button on the navbar, and the "Followers" gadget that's (sometimes) added to the blogs. These differences are causing some confusion.
The Followers gadget lets you login to Following, under any account, Blogger or not - and separate from the account used to login to the navbar. If you so desire, you can Follow any blog without logging in - You'll add a temporary "shadow" icon to the blog (if you choose to Follow publicly), and you'll add the blog feed to your Reading List and / or Google Reader subscription list.
With the Follow link on the navbar, if you're not logged in (using the "Sign In" link), you'll not see a "Follow" link. Once you do login (which you can only do using a Blogger account), you can click on the Follow button. There, you'll get a choice of Following publicly, using your Blogger / Google account - or Following anonymously. If you Follow publicly, you'll use your Blogger profile, as connected with the account used to Sign In to the navbar.
>> Top
The Followers gadget lets you login to Following, under any account, Blogger or not - and separate from the account used to login to the navbar. If you so desire, you can Follow any blog without logging in - You'll add a temporary "shadow" icon to the blog (if you choose to Follow publicly), and you'll add the blog feed to your Reading List and / or Google Reader subscription list.
With the Follow link on the navbar, if you're not logged in (using the "Sign In" link), you'll not see a "Follow" link. Once you do login (which you can only do using a Blogger account), you can click on the Follow button. There, you'll get a choice of Following publicly, using your Blogger / Google account - or Following anonymously. If you Follow publicly, you'll use your Blogger profile, as connected with the account used to Sign In to the navbar.
>> Top
Comments
For some reason, though I could be mistaken, when you follow with either the widget or the new button, it's still different then copy-paste adding directly to your dashboard. The latter of those things the "best idea", in my personal opinion.
I think, though don't quote me, that adding directly to the dashboard is using your Google account while using the button on the nav bar is using your blogger account and using the widget is like not using an account at all.
On a funny note: You can follow all three ways, least last time I checked, and appear in the follower widget 3 times.
Sorry for the long "comment".