(Recently, someone who saw this page told me that the original idea of haiku as error messages might have come from programmers at Be Inc. Unless delberately turned off, all error messages in the NetPositive Web Browser would come out in haiku.)
If you are able to read Japanese and the Japanese text isn't showing properly, choose UTF-8 as your encoding method. (In Firefox, go to view and change encoding to Unicode). As I do all of my web browsing in Linux and various flavors of BSD, I'm not sure if Internet Explorer has also begun using UTF-8 as its standard or if it's still sticking with Shift-JIS.In Japan, they have replaced the impersonal and unhelpful Microsoft error messages with their own Japanese haiku poetry, each only 17 syllables in total: 5 syllables in the first line, 7 in the second, five in the third...
(Actually, a haiku [ 俳句 ] usually refers to
the seasons. So perhaps, these should more properly be called
senryuu [ 川柳 ]which is the usual name for
satirical haiku style poems. At any rate...)
I tried to translate the below into Japanese, but unfortunately,
it's pretty difficult--the 17 syllable poem has very strict
rules--a final N, a doubled letter, a lengthened vowel--all count
as a syllable.
The only one that I was able to even come close with was the one
that reads:
Yesterday it worked.
Today it is not working.
Windows is like that.
I came up with a translation that would read
Today it is no good
Yesterday it worked
Windows.
In Japanese it reads Kyou dame da
Kinou dekita yo
Uindozu
Written in Japanese it goes
今日駄目だ 昨日できたよ ウィンドズ |
Anyway, without further ado...please enjoy
------------------------ A file that big? It might be very useful. But now it is gone. ------------------------ The Web site you seek Can not be located but Countless more exist. ------------------------ Chaos reigns within. Reflect, repent, and reboot. Order shall return. ------------------------ ABORTED effort: 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. ------------------------ First snow, then silence. This thousand dollar screen dies So beautifully. ------------------------ With searching comes loss And the presence of absence: "My Novel" not found. ------------------------ The Tao that is seen Is not the true Tao-until You bring fresh toner. ------------------------ 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.