Welcome back for Season 8, HTers! Woot!

The new season officially starts on July 5. But first! Before we all go crazy with the BB madness, please take a minute to review our site rules posted in this section.

Now, we have some news to share with you all. Our beloved admins, HWG and rappy, have found themselves so busy with real life things that they have passed the leadership torch and ownership of the board to the rest of the admin team. We appreciate their trust in us, and intend to do everything we can to keep this board running smoothly.

We have another change to announce that we hope you will appreciate. We all love Fisty, and now he has an account of his very own! We have set up an account named FistyHT, and we ask that all PMs requesting admin action be sent to this account. The reason for this is that since the account is shared by all the admins, whichever of us is online at any particular time can access it and get your concerns addressed more quickly. This way, HTers don’t have to guess which admin is going to show up next, and maybe send a PM to someone who’s on vacation (or at work, or poking their eyes out because they ran across a photo of Booger). Please contact the FistyHT account for urgent things like troll reports, board blips, etc., but do feel free to PM us individually for other stuff that doesn’t require a really fast response (we love to hear from y’all!).

Finally, we're sure we speak for everyone here when we say THANK YOU to HWG and rappy for everything they’ve done over the years for us. From the birth of HT, to the move from ezboard to here last season, and all the in-between behind-the-scenes stuff that kept it all going, they’ve given us a wonderful community and we appreciate it! Hopefully they can drop in and play with us as time allows. *raise fists in tribute*

And thanks in advance to YOU, HTers, for doing your part in keeping HT a great place to be. You all have always been the best when it comes to being respectful of this site and each other, and we appreciate that very much. As always, holler if you have any questions. Let the party begin!

Gforce, Magpie, MrsGryn, and Tsylyst (and FistyHT!)

More news already! Take a look at the new forum called Fisty's Hideaway, where you'll find all the sort of "off topic" stuff like the Diary Room, test thread, etc.

Meanwhile, THIS forum (Welcome to Hamster Time) is now officially for HT business only. Hopefully, this little reorganization will make it easier for our new members to find their way around.

*tosses a cornnut to Fisty*

You may notice a new addition to the first blue bar on the site. There is now a button that will allow you to syndicate HT Updates to any feed reader.

The button links to AddThis. Once there, you can choose any feed reader to add the HT Updates RSS feed to. The feed is available on everything from your Google/Yahoo/MSN homepages to readers like NewsGator, NetVibes and Bloglines.

So what will be fed to your feed reader? HT Updates delivers the Current BB8 House Standings to your reader every few hours. For example, the feed as of this posting says:

Head of Household: Jen
Nominees for eviction: TBA
Power of Veto: TBA
Eric's America's Player Task: Make HOH target (vote)
Last evicted: Carol (10-1)

With HT Updates, all the vital information from HT is delivered wherever you want it. For example, one benefit of the feed is that with HT Updates you can check the standings without having to visit HT itself -- something some businesses frown on their employers doing on company time.

This is a work in process, so PM me if there are glitches. If you want a direct link to the XML behind the feed, click here.

Also see: What's a feed reader?, What is RSS?

It looks like we're up and running on the new server. Feel free to start posting on this board as opposed to the backup board, but be aware that it may take up to two days for everyone to be able to see and log in to this board.

FIST!

ETA: Leave a note here when you can post on this site.