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Haiku Poetry Messages for Microsoft Errors

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Darwin:
This is tacked to a cork board in my cubbyhole at work - no idea who put it there or what the source is, but I've been wanting to share it for a long time. Finally got around to photocopying, scanning, and extacting the text from it. There are some real gems in here!

In Japan, they have replaced the impersonal and unhelpful Microsoft error messages with Haiku poetry messages. Haiku poetry has strict construction rules each poem has only 17 syllables; 5 syllables in the first, 7 in the second, 5 in the third. They are used to communicate a timeless message, often achieving a wistful, yearning and powerful insight through extreme brevity.

Here are 16 actual error messages from Japan:


* The web site you seek Cannot be located, but Countless more exist.

* Chaos reigns within. Reflect, repent, and reboot. Order shall return.

* Program aborting: close all that you have worked on. You ask far too much.

* Windows NT crashed. I am the Blue screen of Death. No one hears your screams.

* Yesterday it worked. Today it is not working. windows is like that.

* Your file was so big. It might be very useful. But now it is gone.

* Stay the patient course. of little worth is your ire. The network is down.

* A crash reduces Your expensive computer To a simple stone.

* Three things are certain: Death, taxes and lost data. Guess which has occurred.

* You step in the stream, But the water has moved on. This page is not here.

* Out of memory. we wish to hold the whole sky, But we never will.

* Having been erased, The document you're seeking must now be retyped.

* Serious error. All shortcuts have disappeared. Screen. Mind. Both are blank.

Isn't that better than: "your computer has performed an illegal operation"?

ljbirns:
Darwin

These are wonderful !!  May I pass them on ?

Darwin:
Hi Lew - of course you can! I should make an effort, I suppose, to find out the source... the piece of paper posted at work is OLD and it looks like it came from a bulletin board posting somewhere... I'll google the title ( :-[ ok - that's how much of an effort I made before posting - none...) and post what I can come up with.

Darwin:
heh, heh, searching on the title of the original source (which I simply replicated for the title of the thread) has one hit... this thread!

However, searching for "windows haiku" (without the quotes) yielded this: http://www.crisbrady.net/WinHaiku.html, which presents the original error message side-by-side with the Haiku replacement. Nice  :Thmbsup:

This is the only site I could find that seeks to make any sort of attribution: http://www.jzine.com/poetry/haiku.html It dates to 1998 and features a number more haiku than I have included above. It asks that the haiku not be reproduced without permission, so I'll direct you there!

EDIT: note, in the google search I've included above, there are NUMEROUS hits with variations on the this, but many of them are pretty much word for word what I posted. Good fun  :)

tomos:
loads of gems there
You ask far too much ;DWindows NT crashed.
I am the Blue screen of Death.
No one hears your screams.You step in the stream,
But the water has moved on.
This page is not here.but my favourite has to be
Serious error.
All shortcuts have disappeared.
Screen. Mind. Both are blank.Screen.... Mind....   ....blank

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