Hogwarts Live Blog

I know many of you are reeling from the killing of George Floyd and the coronavirus pandemic. Many innocent people have died in recent months and many of you may have friends or family affected by these tragedies whether it's economically, physically, or emotionally.

In honor of George Floyd, Breonna Taylor, Ahmaud Arbery, and many others I will donate all Hogwarts Live donations made during June 2020 to the Equal Justice Initiative (EJI).

I've made the month of June a triple donation month to further reward people who donate to this cause.

For those of you who don't know the EJI is a 4 star charity on Charity Navigator with 91.2% of its expenses going to the programs and services it delivers.

EJI is working towards ending mass incarceration and excessive punishment in the United States, by challenging racial and economic injustice, and protecting basic human rights for the most vulnerable people in American society.

Founded in 1989 by Bryan Stevenson, a widely acclaimed public interest lawyer and bestselling author of Just Mercy, EJI provides legal representation to people who were illegally convicted, unfairly sentenced, or abused in state jails and prisons.

EJI works with communities that have been marginalized by poverty and discouraged by unequal treatment. They are committed to changing the narrative about race in America.

If you wish to donate directly to the EJI you can do so here. If you forward your donation receipt to along with your HL username I will make sure you receive donation points for your donation.

Don't worry if you can't donate, you can sign the petition Justice for Big Floyd.

It's that time of year... the most wonderful time of the year! We know that not everyone celebrates Christmas, but we'd like to wish you all Merry Christmas, Happy Hannukah, Joyous Kwanzaa and/or whatever else you may celebrate. If you don't celebrate anything, we hope this winter is your best one yet :)

We've opened the seasonal village for your enjoyment- Polareia Borealis. Here you will find most of our holiday modules, from the Ice Hotel to the Dreidel game at the peanut stall. You can also try to build the best snowman in all the wizarding world! Or maybe you'd just like to visit the Ice Castle while dressed up in your cool new costume! Also, if you fancy buying a reindeer, they are now available in the pet shop.

We also have opened a Holiday Gift shop which can be found in each village. This is the place to go to buy your family, friends, and even rivals presents for the holidays. The gifts can be opened starting on Christmas Day (December 25) at the fireplace in your Common Room. You will have until December 31 to open them all. In the meantime, you can visit the Fireplace inside your Common Room to check to see how many presents are waiting for you! Everyone will receive at least one present so be sure to open yours on Christmas Day! (NOTE: Some of you may see references to Valentine's Day at the Fireplace. Just ignore it and pretend it says Christmas. xD It's just a typo and doesn't affect your presents.)

In the past we have had a few problems with players being nasty to each other with the Holiday Gifts Anonymous Sender feature. This year, we have in place a security measure to ensure that no one is truly anonymous. Although the recipient of a not-so-nice gift will not know who the gift is from, the Staff will know. Those that send nasty messages through the Holiday Gifts will be dealt with in the same way as if it was said in chat. Offensive messages on gifts can be reported by petition, just like offensive owls, through a link in each gift.

For a little friendly House competition, each House has been given a Holiday Tree to decorate. Players can go to their Common Room and help decorate it by using forest fights, gold and/or gems. The House with the best tree at the end of the year will earn the House buff for the entire month of January.

We hope you enjoy these new features and once again, Happy Holidays!

To all witches and wizards:

October 31st (Halloween) is now officially Staff Appreciation Day. Show your support to the HL staff in any way you can. Even if that means listening to them for a bit (I'm looking at you truant students out there =P).

Just please try and be extra nice to our staff on that special day otherwise I will smite you with a mighty thunderbolt.

Happy Almost Spring! At least to those in the Northern Hemisphere. xD

As the temperatures start to rise and the snowstorms venture forth with their last hurrah of the season, our servers have migrated to more illustrious surroundings to continue the circle of life known as HogwartsLive.

Unlike the the long and arduous trek for thousands upon thousands of birds, ocean creatures, and them animals in Africa who are forced to migrate to find water, the process of migrating servers is usually pretty quick and painless. This time however, it seems that some of you may have gotten lost in the Upside Down, as Poly puts it.

Maybe you log in to find a chat that is hours old with only one or two other people? Which is kinda normal tbh, so scratch that one. But maybe posts have disappeared? Or maybe you find yourself all alone in some parallel universe version of Hogwarts? MaYbE yOu CaN't EvEn LoG iN!?

Unfortunately, we can't magically fix it for you even though we're supposed to be all like Witches and Wizards and stuff. But DON'T PANIC!! YOU, yes YOU, can perform all the magic needed to fix this for yourself! So grab your towel, click the link at the end of this post and prepare to be amazed! Mobile instructions included, for a limited time! (not really limited, that's just a sales pitch) If however, you do not want to attempt this yourself, the problem will correct itself soon.

For those who appreciate a more technical explanation, there's something called DNS. This is like GPS for browsers so they know where to go when you type in a website name. So what happens during migration is, the virtual address of the website gets all mixed and muddled up and sometimes it takes longer for some people's internets to find it again. (Or that might be something I made up entirely because it sounds good and I have no idea what I'm talking about.) (Except that DNS does really exist and it does have something to do with finding and accessing websites.)

tl;dr If HL is all weird, it will fix itself soon or you can clear your DNS cache. Instructions here:

https://buffered.com/tutorials/how-to-flush-dns-cache/

Thanks for playing!

In accordance with the latest blog that has been reposted, if you see something inappropriate or disruptive in chat then please petition for help. Even if there is a staff member online, we are players too and can't monitor the site or chats every minute. We would appreciate it if you can help us help you.

Look over the rules in the FAQs again carefully and don't be afraid to send a detailed petition about the problem. We want to establish and keep and friendly environment for all ages to interact with.

Thanks and enjoy your time on HogwartsLive.

You see Hagrid carrying Holiday Trees to the Common Rooms.

The biggest, sparkliest, twinkliest tree belongs to the Hufflepuff clan!
Many of the other halls also sport beautifully decorated trees in their windows.

Congratulations, Hufflepuff! You keep the House buff until the end of January!

Hey Everyone,

I'm giving away a Hogwarts Live T-shirt!

One lucky player will get to don their very own, custom, Hogwarts Live T-shirt from hogwartslive.spreadshirt.com! :)

Just head on over to the Candy Raffle page under the Global section on the left side of the site and exchange your every flavor beans for raffle tickets.

Beans can be won through special events or acquired through the Prefect's Lounge under Buy Candy.

This raffle ends at the end of July.

Personal attacks are NOT ALLOWED. A personal attack is any comment that is negative toward a persons real life. No matter how mean their role-play character may be to you, there is no excuse to bring their real life into the conversation to attack them. It should have to go unsaid, but due to a sudden increase of people feeling this is for some unkown reason acceptable, that this rule applies to attacking the real life children of players. If you decide you feel it necessary to stoop so low and bring their child(ren) into it, you will instantly be muted for 3 RL days. If after that mute, you continue to make such comments, it will be a week long ban.

We received a request to ask for your help for one of our longtime players, Catherine.

"My father was diagnosed with stage 4 pancreatic cancer. His final wish is to go to Disney Land, but with all his special medical care needs, we can't do it alone. My sister has created a "fundme.com" thing and I know that a lot of HLers are good people at heart and I was hoping to maybe get the chance to put the link here. If, that is, allowed.

http://www.gofundme.com/8rb35h78z4

That's the link. Even if you can't donate, could you consider spreading it out a bit for us? Any help would be greatly appreciated. Thank you for your time."

Thank you for any help you can give!

As I'm sure you all have noticed by now, there is a Holiday Tree in each House's Common Room. Players can go to their Common Room and help decorate it by using forest fights, gold and/or gems. You can check to see who has the biggest, sparkliest, twinkliest tree in every village, right above the chat. The House with the best tree at the end of the year will earn the House buff for the entire month of January. The winning House will be announced sometime after midnight (as soon as we can).

Good luck!

Congratulations to Slytherin for winning the Holiday Tree Contest! They will enjoy the House Buff for the whole month of January!