[Editor’s Note: The Tom’s Hardware staff first published a version of this poem in 2014 on Christmas Eve. We updated it a little bit and ran it again each year at the same time. The poem was given a complete overhaul in 2018 and has been rewritten with new stories and references every year since. The 2021 version is below.
Thank you all for the support and participation you offered in 2021, and we wish you Happy Holidays and a Happy New Year.]
'Twas mid-December and the North Pole was hopping,
As Santa was doing some holiday shopping.
But he soon found out that he couldn't get squat;
Everything that he wanted was scalped by a bot.
He couldn't get a PS5 despite his best,
He couldn't get an Xbox Series X.
He couldn't get GPUs at MSRP,
He couldn't get anything under the tree!
Santa couldn't wait, not even a bit,
Unlike Pat Gelsinger, he's too old for this s**t.
So he went to the workshop to pull out some tricks:
His elves would build exploding USB sticks.
Then Rudolph and Cupid and Dasher and Prancer
Would blow up the scalper PCs as the answer!
While he knew that property destruction's no bueno,
He'd still blow their tops like a crypto volcano.
Even though he could get some gifts as intended,
The component shortage still hasn't ended.
But he couldn't give up, he couldn't stop.
So his elves would fab what they could in the shop.
And when that work was water under the bridge,
He grabbed a drink from his Xbox-shaped fridge.
He knew how much more beer he needed to buy,
It had come from a keg with a Raspberry Pi.
No matter what you’re celebrating this year,
Hanukkah, Kwanzaa or Christmas with cheer;
We at Tom’s Hardware wish you the best,
And we’ll be at our benches, running our tests.
