Last year, Arqade had a little promotion around the holidays called the Hat Dash, wherein meeting certain activity thresholds would earn hats that a user's avatar could then "wear" throughout the site:
This year, Stack Exchange has decided to open up the Hat Dash to any site that decides to opt-in. The specifics:
This event will run from 19 December 2012 to 4 January 2013. Users will be able to see their entire hat collection on http://winterba.sh. That site will also have a landing page, explaining the rules and other details of the event.
Individual users who don’t want to participate, don’t want to see hats, and/or are generally anti-hat will have an "I hate hats" option available, just as we had on Gaming last year.
The only visual change to the site itself will be the presence of the hats and the "I hate hats" button in the footer.
We need to respond by November 28th if the site would like to participate. Any site that does not respond by that date is considered to be opted-out.
So, what say you, people of A.SE? Should we participate in the Hat Dash this year, or would we prefer to opt-out of it entirely?
We have opted in to this promotion, so prepare for the arrival of hats this December!
