Submit your Techie Haiku!

Originating in 15th century Japan, writing Haiku has been an age old way way to convey a vivid impression poetically in only 17 syllables. Up until now, Haiku has mostly fixated on the natural world. ThinkGeek wants to bring the same poetic substance to the technological realm.

Can you write techie Haiku? Of course you can. It doesn't matter that poets and technologists have little in common other than passion and brains. So whether you enjoy technology, have a way with words or at least have a proclivity to try something new - send ThinkGeek your techie Haikus. If you do, we may just send you a $50 ThinkGeek Gift Certificate. (Read the details.) Express yourself to strangers! It's cathartic!

PAST WINNERS MADE FAMOUS IN OUR NEWSLETTER

All I want is to
Find a pretty orc girlfriend,
But DM says no.
--Ian in Somers Point, New Jersey

Beware of Bathrooms
Rule number two. Number two?
Coincidence? Hmm.
--Jae in Charleston, Illinois

Divide by zero;
Stephen Hawking can do this.
Black holes will ensue...
--David in St. Joseph, Missouri

When I read haiku,
I hear it in the voice of
William Shatner.
--Shannon in Wall, New Jersey

Bugs and viruses
Incompetent end users
Job security...
--Janice in Edmond, Oklahama

Sitting in my lab.
Look at all the mutagens.
I could be super...
--Alex in East Lansing, Michigan

the tricorder broke
communicator is dead
and my shirt is red
--Jeffrey in Dallas, Texas

Use the Force, Malcolm
Gorram reavers on our tail!
Oops, wrong universe.
--Taylor in Montgomery, Alambama

Eat Theobromine.
Drink methyltheobromine.
Heliophobe, I.
--Zach in Tyler, Texas

like mom used to say
"zombie is as zombie does"
so i ate her brains
-- Manuel in Beunos Aires, Argentina

Hold infinity,
within the palm of your hand.
Buffer overflow.
-- Paul in Durham, United Kingdom

Haikus are easy
Yes, even with my eyes closed
See, thhy are npt hrad!
-- Micah in Phoenix, Arizona

WITH ALL CAPS I TYPE
LOUDLY I YELL EVERYTHING
I FEEL IMPORTANT!
-- Ed in Logan, Utah

Execute Spybot,
Please click Ni to continue.
Damn Trojan Rabbits
-- Julian in Black Mesa, City 17

Droning on and on
Talking about the atom
What an awful Bohr.
-- Michael in Johnston, Rhode Island

jIba' Quo'nos-daq
qeqtaHvIS tIQqu' lurDech:
tlhIngan Haiku!
Translation:
I sit here on Quo'nos
Practicing the ancient tradition:
Klingon Haiku.
-- Dale in Redding, California

Pi day celebrates
An irrational number.
Pi is not a lie.
-- Anne in Elwood, Australia

Net Neutrality
Keep the Man off my bandwidth
Don't throttle me, bro.
-- Eric in Lincoln, Nebraska

The next big idea
Will soon sweep across the net
Oh, it just finished.
-- Gilmore in Melbourne, Australia

Imagination
More important than knowledge
Great example: LOST
-- Brandon in Hinesville, Georgia

Hot Anime Girls
Never Gonna Give You Up
No! Not Rick Astley!
-- Lauren, White Bear Lake, Minnesota

Developer Zen:
"Ignore this error message."
What do I do now?
-- Stephen in Deerfield, Massachusetts

One Two Seven Dot
Zero Dot Zero Dot One
There's no place like home.
-- Martin in Bedford, United Kingdom

Your razor-sharp wit
Can never stand up to my
Adamantium
-- Anna in St. Louis, Missouri

Chekov in the bay
searching hard for some space fuel
Nuclear wessels
-- Jay in Murfreesboro, Tennessee

I bit a zombie.
it was ironic but the
taste was terrible.
-- Blake in Tulsa, Oklahoma

Learn from the Jedi.
Discipline, control, respect.
Dangerous muppet.
-- Patrick in Anaheim, California

Packets of photons
Streaming by our planet's sky
their address divine
-- Michaline in Chicago Illinois

Hum of computer
Torrenting throughout the night
Don't forget to seed.
-- Michael from Houston, Texas

ThinkGeek plastic bag
Promises a monkey's breath
Much like cake is lie.
-- Andy in Core, West Virginia

Steaming hot laptop
On my boyfriend's lap becomes
Form of birth control.
-- Hana in The Shire, Middle Earth

I can't do haiku
I will always get them wrong
Oh, wait. Never mind.
-- Randy in Bradley, Illinois

run ThinkGeekHaiku
Segmentation fault (core dumped)
I hate debugging
-- Aaron in Simi Valley, California

Some haiku are strange
They don't make very much sense
A series of tubes
-- Sean in Eugene, Oregon

There once was a boy with mind quick
And ThinkGeek dot com he did trick.
They expected to find,
Haikus in a line.
What they got instead was a lim'rick
-- Alex in Melbourne, Australia

Spam in my inbox.
Can I really help this guy?
From Nigeria?
-- Timothy in Peterborough, England

I love the tech life
It lets me IM the guy
Sitting next to me
-- Akela in San Francisco, California

the sun warms my face
it is a lovely....ding dong
wait, I have IM
-- Rhett in Hammond, Louisiana

Client with no specs.
Wants results in two weeks time.
Must. Not. Kill. Must. Not.
-- Shane in River Ridge, Louisiana

TPS reports.
Didn't make a coversheet.
See you here Sunday.
-- Dan in Palm Beach Gardens, Florida

I hate dungeons, but
I guess beauty's in the eye
of The Beholder.
-- Kat in Virginia Beach, Virginia

The Mac hates popcorn
I dropped some on the keyboard
It kernel panicked
-- Derek in Hoboken, New Jersey

two words never heard
in polite conversation
Microsoft Vista
-- Dave in Mont Vernon, New Hampshire

THE DETAILS

  • Create your own original Haiku and email it to us (see below!)
  • Haikus are three lines, with the first line having five syllables, the second seven and the third five. If you don't know what a syllable is, hold your breath and repeat until blue. Or if you prefer, see the samples below.
  • Your Haiku MUST be geeky and/or infused with a technological bent.
  • We'll accept anything (because we don't have an imperfect Haiku filter...YET!), but what we are mostly looking for are Haiku that meet the criteria above and also any of the following:
    • Convey a complex technology truism into seventeen flowing syllables
    • Take a mundane, prosaic techie activity and through poetry show us some simple humor
    • Relate to current events in the technology world
    • Catch our eye at the perfect angle! (which means everybody should try, our eyes are all over the place)

HOW DO I GET STARTED?

  • Agree to our very basic terms below
  • Email the following to haiku@thinkgeek.com:
    • Your First Name
    • Your location (City/State or City/Country)
    • Your Haiku
  • We'll notify each winner by email. Only one winner will be selected for each newsletter.
  • We'll only publish results via our monthly newsletter (not subscribed?) that include your name, your location as well as your Haiku. So give us all three or you can't win!
  • We will NOT post your last name under any circumstances. If you prefer that we do not post your first name, please let us know.

THE TERMS / CONDITIONS / LEGALESE

  • By submitting your Haiku to ThinkGeek, you assert that the Haiku is your original material. You will indemnify ThinkGeek should you submit the copyrighted material of others without permission.
  • ThinkGeek will select winners based on its own subjective criteria.
  • ThinkGeek will select one winner prior to each Newsletter it sends out. The winning Haiku will be published within our newsletter along with the First name and location of the author as submitted above.
  • One winner per ThinkGeek newsletter will receive a $50 ThinkGeek gift certificate via email.
  • You can submit as many original Haikus as you like, please keep them within a single email to make it easier on us though.
  • If you submit your original Haiku and it doesn't win for a specific newsletter, you may choose to re-submit the same Haiku in the future. But hey, it didn't win for a reason. So try 'refining' it ;)
  • Your submitted Haiku will become the property of ThinkGeek, Inc.
  • ThinkGeek reserves the right to change the terms of this contest at any time, and we may terminate the contest at any time, at our discretion.
  • Any submission to haiku@thinkgeek.com consititutes agreement with these terms.
  • ThinkGeek is not evil, never has been, nor will ever be. Period.

ThinkGeek Techie Haikus Didn't Make Me Famous, But They Helped Me Vent!