... or is there kind of a newbie (those who don't read any existing posts at all, just posting questions that are... errm... extremely newbie like) wave flooding HA in the last days? Could it be a seasonal thing?

The problem is that most new people here don't use search function at all. BTW similar problem was disscussed ealier. When I began to be a HA member I spent many hours reading posts and opinions which other people posted here. Even now, when I regularly read most new post here, I do a search before posting because I know how other people are frustrated reading about the same trivial thing over and over again.
So, like other members suggested ealier in other post, it would be a great idea that new members should not have ability to post here for some period of time...

We associate this with free email provider banlist failure caused by bugs in forum software (now fixed thanks to kode54). We also had some of usual offenders (hi KK) make use of that, but the situation is under control.

Ah, good news