Little hamsters, scurrying about, sending data back and forth to their destinations. They travel along this pathway -- this series of tubes.

Does this work?

I'm glad we have some entries, at least. Honestly, I am not sure why 140 characters seems so difficult. I find that it's not too hard to trim twiction down (I always write too much at first) and then do a few minor tweaks until it's the right number. This does mean you might have to do some *gasp* editing, which I know is intolerable and defeats the point of receiving artistic praise without any effort, but come on. These STILL won't take you a hot ten minutes.

Anyway, acmed, I count 172 characters, which is 32 too many. Cenere, as you know, you're one character off. If I didn't know any better, I'd say you did that on purpose to make a point. Regardless, you could edit your entry and resubmit if you are interested in qualifying. I like what you have so far. Frank and Poison, both of your entries fit the requirements.

If people are really into having a range instead of 140 exactly, it is certainly worth consideration. I don't think it's an unreasonable suggestion. But I don't think it would be fair to change the rules in the middle of a round. So rule changes will be discussed more in depth and possibly implemented after the first round.

Think about it:
The internet is a place with unlimited space.  Yet we had to come up with a new system so we will not run out of addresses.

I think having a range would be easier cause then I could express the irony of this in a way that sounds better.

Anyway, acmed, I count 172 characters, which is 32 too many

I counted mine in Word without spaces. Can it stay? PLEAAAAAAAAAAAASE

PLEAAAAAAAAAAAASE

What do you say, Acmed?

Can we add unnecessary punctuation? :D

So, there was this really hot chick. She had boobs and stuff you know? So this dude thought she was beautiful, so they went out. the end. :)

Can it stay? PLEAAAAAAAAAAAASE

Oh, how could I resist the siren cry of "please". Your entry will be disqualified if it does not meet the character requirement. If you are having trouble counting characters, I recommend the following:

public static int charsInTwiction( String tweet )
{
     int count;
     for ( count = 0 ; count < tweet.length() ; count++ );
     return count;
}

That's almost exactly what my method looks like.

Anyway, moving on: Stormdragon, I count 139 characters in your story. Can you double check to make sure it fits in the character limit? The first line is 15, then the newline is 1, then the next paragraph is 123 characters. For a total of 139. I like the concept.

Hallfrost, your entry looks good. Not EXACTLY sure how it relates to the theme. I'll judge it as is, but if, say, I forgot to tell you there was a theme, feel free to submit an update.

I think having a range would be easier cause then I could express the irony of this in a way that sounds better.

Noted. Your opinion will be considered as the rules are updated after this round. Thank you for your feedback.

Think about it:
The internet is a place with unlimited space.   Yet we had to come up with a new system so we will not run out of addresses.

Stormdragon, I count 139 characters in your story. Can you double check to make sure it fits in the character limit? The first line is 15, then the newline is 1, then the next paragraph is 123 characters. For a total of 139. I like the concept.

I did miss count but only because I counted the space between up and with twice.  I added an extra space between the two sentences in the paragraph so it will fit the character count.

Looks like it fits now, Stormdragon.

Anyway, I may not get around judging until Thursday.