Is there a way to have the system automatically turn URLs into hyperlinks?

Which system are you referring to? The forums? If so, no - they're not programmed to do that. It has unfortunately led to some problems in the past.

Yup, right http://here.com :(

Yeah - there were some problems with misuse on that when we started. I'll give it some thought going forward.

I've changed the editor to one that provides a toolbar button for creating links. Neither of the Web browsers I use are doing automatic linking, but I'm not sure if IE will do that or not. Right now, this is the limit of the functionality I can provide - the editor is a "replaceable" module and it's now using the most full-featured editor provider I can get hold of.