Can an influx of eager voters ready to click the polls in OzHipHop’s annual user-voted gongs have brought the already heavily-trafficked site to its knees? It’s been down for a few hours now, no doubt depriving some of Australia’s most enthusiastic hip-hop fans of their only source of amusement.

UPDATE: OHH is live again as of yesterday afternoon. Vote here. Funkoars hold an early lead in the Best Album, Group and Track categories, with Delta ahead in the Solo album stakes.

Nominations for the 2006 Ozhiphop.com awards are in full swing. Each user on the site’s heavily-trafficked forums has one nomination in each of the 37 categories, which range from Best Album to Best Radio Show to Best Verse to Best Club DJ and so on and so on. Once a candidate is nominated three times, it becomes a nominee and can be voted for once that process commences on Wednesday 24 January. The exact mechanism for voting has yet to be announced, but it may be via email submission.

Because the awards are entirely community nominated and voted, some of the outcomes might have that artist-with-the-most-friends-wins flavour. That’s why it’s important to get your post on here and vote when the time comes around.

Vote early and vote often!