Late Morning Update

Here's the latest on the launch. The message boards are now completely down and will be for at least several hours as the engineers take the next steps to get us ready. While that's happening, the Launch Pad message board will be active and lively and you'll be able to find your fellow refugees here. You can also hang out here at our Community News Blog for updates.

User vtkdawso had a good idea that we post an FAQ at the top of the board because a lot of the same questions are being asked. We'll do that shortly. And several users - i.e. the back pain and epilepsy communities - have started their own threads; that's great as well.

Also, for people who have joined us over the last hour or two, here's a portion of a message we posted early this morning:

When we launch, there are some great new features coming including better navigation, better search, and member home pages. And there are also going to be some problems that you helped us identify during our beta - we've already made a few of those changes and you'll see them when the new boards go live. We expect some of the rest to start appearing over the next 8 or 10 days. So bear with us over the month of August as we make the improvements (your feedback was incredibly helpful, btw).

We're also requesting your help. Those of you who have become regulars on the Launch Pad board are going to be the people most familiar with this new look and feel when we go live. While we'll have our moderators working around the clock over the next few days, we would appreciate you jumping in when you can. Assure your fellow board friends that while the changes can be startling at first (change always is, isn't it?) that you guys have already been using them, and maybe even supply some tips you've learned about the new features. And reassure them that the bumpy parts of the new boards are being worked on now and will get better as we go.

More as the afternoon progresses!