Several years ago Sony announced its own computer operating system now available on
its hot new portable PC called the Vaio. Instead of producing the cryptic
error messages characteristic of Microsoft's Windows 95, 3.1,and DOS operating
systems, Sony's chairman Asai Tawara said:
We intend to capture the high
ground by putting a human, Japanese face on what has been until now an
operating system that reflects Western cultural hegemony. For example,
we have replaced the impersonal and unhelpful Microsoft error messages
with our own Japanese Haiku poetry.
The chairman went on to give examples
of Sony's new error messages:
*********************
Chaos reigns within.
Reflect, repent and reboot.
Order shall return.
*********************
A file that big?
It might be very useful.
But now it is gone.
*********************
The Web site you seek
cannot be located
but countless more exist
********************
ABORTED effort:
Close all that you have worked on.
You ask way too much.
********************
Yesterday it worked.
Today it is not working.
Windows is like that.
********************
First snow, then silence.
This thousand dollar screen
Dies so beautifully.
********************
Windows NT crashed.
I am the Blue Screen of Death.
No one hears your screams.
********************
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.
********************
Having been erased,
The document you're seeking
Must now be retyped.
********************
Serious error.
All shortcuts have disappeared.
Screen. Mind. Both are blank.