Holiday 2011 Hat Dash: The Hattening

Throughout history, men have worn hats as a way of showing how much better they are than other men. “I buy hats,” a behatted man seems to say. “I am better than you.”

In wartime, hats were a useful way of conferring rank, and ensuring that casualties were confined to the lower classes… During peacetime, hats have been instrumental for men to let the non-hatted know just who is wearing the hat around here.

— The Team Fortress 2 Classless Update

The holidays are almost upon us: a time for family, gifts, and of course hours and hours of video games.  To celebrate the season (and since we heard you like hats) we thought we’d throw a little party.  We’re calling it… Hat Dash!

For three weeks, decorate your gaming.stackexchange.com gravatar with custom hats:

• Unlock game-themed hats for asking and answering questions about top holiday games
• Get special hats for reaching the rep cap, voting, earning or giving a bounty, or participating on meta and chat
• Earn the coveted user-of-the-day crown for being the most upvoted user
• …and much, much more!  Over 20 hats in all!

Hats show up all over the site, wherever your gravatar is shown (well, except for a few places where they didn’t fit).  To change which hat you’re wearing, or to admire your lovely hat collection, just visit your user page:

The event only lasts until January 6th, after which all hats go back into storage.  So hurry up and…do what you’re already doing!  Ask questions about awesome games!

For all you hat haters out there, we offer a way out: at the bottom of each page you’ll find a convenient “I hate hats” link.  But please give it a try before you bail out: you may find a hat you like!