Yep, go back and check the soundtrack on your well-worn copy of 2001 and you'll find that HAL 9000 was born January 12, 1992, in Urbana, Illinois. Which means HAL will soon be nine years old.

What adds a note of melancholy to the event is the fact that, as we know from the movie, HAL will have only one more birthday. Because at the end of 2001 he is (how to put this delicately?) turned off, for a while anyway. (Of course, in 2010 he gets turned on again, but that's a whole other kettle of monoliths.)

Anyway, we're celebrating. And we invite you to join in.

The contest is basically very simple. All you need to do is create a birthday card for HAL, an Internet birthday card, and e-mail it to us. Makers of the three best cards get a Magellan's Log t-shirt. And we'll publish the winning designs here.

RULES
Because of bandwidth and other technical considerations, we're imposing some haiku-like limits on the design of the cards:

1. The birthday card must be one page only.

2. It can be a graphic with or without text, or it can be text alone. An animated gif is OK, but no video, no avi, etc.

3. Feel free to use music or sound, but it must be a midi file. No mp3's accepted, and no streaming audio (or video).

Deadline for entries is 11:59 P.M. (Greenwich Mean Time), December 31, 2000.

Send entries to: magellan@texaschapbookpress.com

Send this page to a friend.

Magellan's Log front page