tinywords haiku news
tinywords' purpose:
humanize technology,
spread haiku worldwide.
tinywords published its 600th haiku today. Yeah!
Cranky readers, cranky editor
I got this email this morning from a cranky knowitall:
Please remove me from your list. I have studied and written Haiku for 30 years now, and I can't believe the tripe Hallmark card attempts at Haiku you publish. I have been published in several serious and respected magazines and I can't stand to see obviously made up, unexperienced poems like you constantly publish. I would advise a re-read of Henderson's books. You completely miss the point.
These kinds of messages really piss me off. First of all, tinywords is a free site. I do this in my spare time, and don't charge a dime for the haiku. Want to gripe at someone? Send a nasty letter to Microsoft, which has taken probably hundreds of dollars of your money, only to blow it on useless features and overblown Windows marketing campaigns. Or our alleged president, who is right this minute spending billions of your dollars on something you probably disagree with fundamentally, regardless of your political opinions. But picking on tinywords? That's like kicking kittens.
Second, tastes vary. Sure, not every haiku I select is going to strike a chord of cosmic awareness in every single reader. But don't trash my efforts here just because you disagree with some (or even most) of the haiku I select.
I make an effort to select quality haiku, I try to improve my own ability to assess haiku, and I reach out to other publications and haiku poets in order to improve the pool of haiku submissions. And I have to wade through a lot of submissions in order to get a few haiku that I consider worthy of tinywords.
Finally, tinywords enjoys the support of some truly world-class haiku poets, publishers, and scholars. Just browse the archives to see who's been published there. No doubt many of them disagree with lots of my selections, too. In fact, some of these people are ardent critics of tinywords. But they do so with a spirit of friendly encouragement -- challenging me to raise the standards of the site which, increasingly, is a collective endeavor -- rather than just shooting spitballs from the balcony.
Don't like the haiku on tinywords? Send me some you think are better. Or go start your own haiku site, and see if you can do better, bub.
What do you think? (remove "spam" from email address to contact me)
Quick facts: tinywords.com was founded in November 2000 by D. F. Tweney to deliver haiku to wireless devices and Internet email addresses. Haiku are short poems of 17 syllables or less, and most tinywords messages are under 100 characters long -- making them ideally suited to delivery on mobile devices.
As of February 2003, tinywords.com has more than 2,000 subscribers in a wide variety of countries, representing every continent on Earth except Antarctica.
Haiku poets published on tinywords.com include rank novices as well as distinguished haiku poets and translators. "We welcome fine haiku of all kinds, regardless of whether it's your first haiku or your ten thousandth," says Tweney.
For more background info on tinywords, see our page about haiku. Find out about tinywords.com's purpose by reading our business plan. And don't miss our archive of haiku published on tinywords.com, including a handy search engine.
Read our press releases:
tinywords.com contest results. The winners of our first-ever National Poetry Month Contest (14 May 2001)
tinywords.com surpasses 1,000 subscribers. The shortest press release you will ever read. (10 May 2001)
Want to know more? Looking for a press contact or a good quote? Send email to publisher d. f. tweney, dft at tinywords dot com!
Coverage of tinywords.com:
jessamyn west's weblog for librarians pointed out some of tinywords' recent library haiku on 10/4 and 10/5/2001.
San Jose / Silicon Valley Business Journal (9/24/2001)
memepool mentioned tinywords on 09/07/2001
GnomeFAVORITE award from Chris Pirillo's newsletter, Lockergnome. "Nothing like a little ancient culture to start off your day right, right? Hold me closer, tiny words," writes Pirillo. (24 April 2001)
Haiku casts big Net: The Milwaukee Journal Sentinel (31 March 2001).
The Vancouver Sun names tinywords.com a Hot Site. "'Fresh haiku delivered daily' is the promise here and that's exactly what you get." (22 March 2001).
Netsurfer Digest recommends tinywords.com. (6 March 2001).
