01:00 22-March-2006

This coming Friday, March 24, 2006 www.ChokaOnIt.com is proud to host a first in the history of poetry: a choka cage match. Choka are a Japanese form of poetry, similar to, but pre-dating haiku. The poets known as Frank Zappai and awgeez will be trading couplets from 17:00 until 21:00 Pacific Time. The results will be kept on Choka On It(tm) for posterity, the winner will be instilled, yet again on the Wall of Fame.

Both poets are Wall of Fame multi-timers. Frank Zappai mostly for his dogged research, awgeez for occasional biting social commentary. They both, however are enmeshed in controversy on the site, and have positions in Shame Alley. Mr. Zappai was referred to by the governing authorities just last week, as “a poetic skinhead punk,” and has had some of his work barred. Awgeez too has crossed into the realm of the socially uncertain with religious commentary. The cage match is certain to be entertaining, frenetic and strange.

The judging will be done by the site’s founders, birdhead and the current reigning English Haiku Slugfest Champion of the World b1-66er, possibly with the help of others. Says the birdhead, “We considered running the competition for 24 hours but realized these two would probably kill each other. Four hours is dangerous enough the way it is,” adding, “we’re requiring the contestants to sign indemnity waivers.” B1-66er brusque as always says, “Both these guys are both capable of being spudnuts. It won’t be pretty.”

The public is encouraged to join in the festivities on www.ChokaOnIt.com.

-- Choka On It - History at a Glance --
6-February-2006: Choka On It created on a “Blogger” Web page.
6-March-2006: Overwhelming popularity forces single couplet choices in the judging of Wall of Fame and Shame Alley recipients.
9-March-2006: 1,000 couplets reached. Mad rush at choka contributions forces move to www.chokaonit.com and a switch to Six Apart’s authoring tool “Movable Type.”
17-March-2006: First splog (spam-blog) post. Choka poets get peeved and double normal output -- mostly about spam.
19-March-2006: Concordance added. Choka contributions immediately double.
22-March-2006: Cage match -- awgeez vs. Frank Zappai

-- About Choka On It -- Choka are a form of Japanese poetry related to, but pre-dating, haiku. “Choka On It” is a collaborative choka residing at the Web address www.chokaonit.com and created by two shadowy figures known only as the birdhead and b1-66er. The public are encouraged to add a couplet of their choosing (consisting of 7 and 5 syllables). Reading and adding to the choka is completely free of charge. No username, password, email address nor Web site are necessary for contribution. Every week the best couplets are granted a place on the Wall of Fame, lameness is given a kick-in-the-teeth with a mention on Shame Alley. Choka On It is now the largest choka ever written with over 1,700 couplets produced in a mere seven weeks. The birdhead and b1-66er have a stated goal of buying pizza with the money they make from clicking-through on adsense ads. They’re hungry. The choka will feed.

19-March-2006 01:00

-- Concordance Added to Record Breaking Poem --

The World’s Largest Choka(tm) (www.chokaonit.com) has added a concordance, making the record-breaking Web site even more impressive, interesting and fun.

A concordance is a listing of the frequency of words found in any one body of written work. Throughout history concordances have typically been used almost exclusively for lengthy, socially significant, books and documents such as the Bible, the Koran and the works of Shakespeare. Scholars use concordances to study the language, and underlying zeitgeist, of a body of work.

A rare conference call with the two creators of the World’s Largest Choka provided more insight. The programming genius known as birdhead put it this way, “The concordance on the choka appears in the right margin of the Web page. We first exclude the 100 most common words in the English language -- such as ‘the’ -- from consideration. We then display the 100 words most common to the choka in a size that is roughly relative their frequency of appearance in the poem.”

-- Is the Choka Something Bigger Than a Poem? --

The result of the concordance is strikingly beautiful and, once again, brings into question if the choka is merely a piece of writing by various contributors, or more a form of collaborative pop art for the 21st century.

The birdhead adds, “By supplying a concordance, I do not want to imply in any way that the choka is a holy document similar to the Bible. It is not. I just think it’s very cool.”

A voice at this point came onto the call that is suspected to be, but cannot be fully confirmed as, the poet/creator known as b1-66er, “I think the birdhead is wrong. I think the concordance proves the choka is holy.” This was followed by several clattering sounds and, unfortunately, the call was dropped.

-- The Most Popular Words --

At this time the most common word is “choka,” followed by “internet” and surprisingly, “frank.” At the bottom of the top 100 are “call,” “maybe” and “want.”

The birdhead assures people that the choka is still under development. “There’s always more to do.” Stay tuned.

-- Choka On It - History at a Glance --

6-February-2006: Choka On It created on a “Blogger” Web page.

6-March-2006: Overwhelming popularity forces single couplet choices in the judging of Wall of Fame and Shame Alley recipients.

9-March-2006: 1,000 couplets reached. Mad rush at choka contributions forces move to www.chokaonit.com and a switch to Six Apart’s authoring tool “Movable Type.”

19-March-2006: Concordance added. Choka contributions immediately double.

-- About Choka On It --

Choka are a form of Japanese poetry related to, but pre-dating, haiku. “Choka On It” is a collaborative choka residing at the Web address www.chokaonit.com and created by two shadowy figures known only as the birdhead and b1-66er. The public are encouraged to add a couplet of their choosing (consisting of 7 and 5 syllables). Reading and adding to the choka is completely free of charge. No username, password, email address nor Web site are necessary for contribution. Every week the best couplets are granted a place on the Wall of Fame, lameness is given a kick-in-the-teeth with a mention on Shame Alley. Choka On It is now the largest choka ever written with over 1,500 couplets produced in a mere six weeks. The birdhead and b1-66er have a stated goal of buying pizza with the money they make from clicking-through on adsense ads. It will come to pass. Oh yes.

9-March-2006 01:00

World’s Longest Poem Attempt Becomes World’s Largest Choka

-- 1,000 Couplets and Counting --

Choka is a form of Japanese poetry, related to (but pre-dating) haiku, with an alternating 5-7 syllabic structure and a non-defined length. Only a month ago, b1-66er and the birdhead had the idea to make a Web site enabling literally anyone who could count syllables and speak English to tack on their own couplets to this (now immortal) phrase opening:

Oh great Internet
Home to world's information
I have learned so much

Polterzeitgeist Productions is proud to announce that “Choka On It” has just become the World’s Largest Choka(tm) -- smashing all previous records, topping 1,200 couplets, and climbing. Birdhead, the programming genius behind the project put it this way, “It’s fun and surprisingly addictive. There’s definitely a community building and it’s great to watch. The choka makes me laugh every day.”

B1-66er points out that the choka is averaging more than 1.4 couplets an hour, 24 hours a day, 7 days a week. “There are maniacs out there. People that seem to almost have some weird poetic form of Tourette’s. Our most prolific poets, Frank Zappai and awgeez, for example, have had weekends of posting over 200 couplets.” When asked if most of what’s being posted is the equivalent of poetic trash, b1 smiles and says, “It depends on what your definition of ‘trash’ is.”

There’s also poignancy. Chicagoan suttonhoo has posted such gems as:

Web's fine filament; are we
predator or prey?

B1-67er has proffered the computer-innuendo filled:

Spiders crawl hidden corners
Trivia is dead

-- Big Baby Gets New Home http://www.ChokaOnIt.com --

The birdhead says, “I was worried that we were going to make Blogger puke, so we moved the site.” To celebrate what is now the World’s Largest Choka, the entire site has been moved from bigpoem.blogspot.com to www.ChokaOnIt.com and is now run under the control of Movable Type. The birdhead chirps, “It’s running flawlessly.”

The public are openly encouraged to contribute. No registration, not even an email address, is necessary. B1-66er sums it up, “This is the easiest shot the average citizen will ever have to be a part of history. What’s stopping you?”

6-February-2006 01:00

Press Release

With the American Super Bowl now over and the Winter Olympics soon upon us, you’re almost certainly asking yourself the same questions we are: just what is that stain on the rug? and, as importantly, what about poetry?

Our answers? We claim the stain is M&M’s ground into the floor (at least, that’s what we tell our housemates), but the poetry question has us bugged.

After too many sleepless nights we decided to answer the poetry question with “Choka On It(tm),” the world’s longest poem. And you, yes you dear reader, can (and should) contribute to it.

If you hadn’t fallen asleep in poetry class you would have learned that choka are a form of Japanese poetry, pre-dating haiku, and using a 5-7-5-7-5-7-5...7-7 syllabic structure (onji). In order to create the world’s longest poem (and no, we don’t know what the current record is – we’ll just beat whatever it is anyway), we’re borrowing an idea from another Japanese poetry style (renga) and are allowing any author to contribute to the poem.

Choka On It begins with the soon-to-be-infamous three lines:

Oh great Internet
Home to world's information
I have learned so much

Anyone in the world can go to the poem’s home (bigpoem.blogspot.com) and tag on a non-rhyming English couplet of seven and five syllables. Superlative additions to the poem will be granted a spot on the Choka Wall of Fame. Couplets exuding lameness will find an unworthy place tucked in a bad part of Shame Alley. All people are encouraged to use our "I Choka'd" badge.

The near-geniuses behind the poem are two shadowy figures: b1-66er, the current English Haiku Slugfest Champion of the World; and birdhead, an Internet bit hacker of great renown. As you would expect from people doing self-aggrandizing self promotion, we’re expecting greatness. Choka On It rides atop Google’s supreme Blogger offering and derives its revenue stream entirely from viewers supporting the site’s AdSense ads. When pressed for revenue predictions, b1-66er and birdhead will tell you they expect income at a level to afford a Beau Jo’s pizza (possibly with everything on it) before the end of 2006.

About Choka On It Choka On It resides at bigpoem.blogspot.com and is the creation of b1-66er and birdhead; through the help of mere English speaking mortals, it is intended and designed to become the world’s biggest poem.

Safe Harbor Statements under The Private Securities Litigation Reform Act of 1995: This release contains certain forward-looking statements of Choka On It. Such statements are subject to certain risks and uncertainties, and actual circumstances, events or results may differ materially from those projected in such forward-looking statements. Factors that could cause or contribute to differences include, but are not limited to: whether or not those are really M&M stains on the carpet, people’s willingness to add to the choka, whether Beau Jo’s jacks up the prices on their pizza, as well as the birth of birdhead’s first child.

B1-66er and birdhead caution readers not to place undue reliance on any forward-looking statements. Seriously. It’s very possible they don’t know what the hell they’re talking about. Sometimes they just say stuff to see how it sounds. B1-66er and birdhead do not undertake, and specifically disclaim any obligation, to update or revise any forward-looking statements to reflect new circumstances or anticipated or unanticipated events or circumstances as they occur. Especially if this whole choka thing is a flop.

Note: this announcement appeared in the following places:

• http://www.free-press-release-center.info/pr00000000000000000480.html
• http://www.prleap.com/pr/25955/
• http://www.pressbox.co.uk/detailed/Arts/
  ContributetotheWorldsBiggestPoem_52613.html