We know that Christmas 1.0, the First Noël,
In Bethlehem compiled rather well;
After Jesus was born in a manger, no possible upgrade was ever required.
But then came shareware known as "Santa Claus,"
Whose program features soon went viral ‘cause
He was passing out gifts and had reindeer and elves, which is how 2.0 got rewired.

But as of late, the obsolete routines of "Ho-Ho-Ho"
Have finally necessitated Christmas 3.0:
Just consider the twenty-first century’s need for alternative sources of energy.
As elves put new technology in motion,
It overheats the nearby Arctic Ocean,
And poor Santa is getting no younger; his weight puts his health into serious jeopardy.

Yes, it's a detrimental trend,
And wasteful habits have to end.
The North Pole workshops now intend
To help the earth and sea to mend.

Let’s talk about the Yuletide algorithms
Which engineers will build into their systems:
The first thing to go will be punishing unruly children with dark lumps of coal—
Such boys and girls from now on will receive a rash
Instead, and then their android phones will crash,
And the EPA then will have no need for fossil-fuel backlash up at the North Pole.

The work of yet another Christmas team
Involves transforming snowfields into steam,
So the steam can give power to doll-making factories, sugar-plum mills, and so forth.
One problem that the scientists are facing
Is shrinkage from the ice cap they’re erasing,
And now you can well understand what has happened to all of the snow in the north.

But there is more to Santa’s blueprint
To save the world’s environment.
He wants to see smog disappear into the wind,
Resolving its high carbonated footprint.

By use of artificially induced intelligence
Combined with GPS earth-mapping elegance,
Soon a self-driving sleigh will transport Modern Santa upon his December commute.
No longer need he stuff himself down chimneys
Where narrow squeezing hurts his tender kidneys:
Using virtual reality he will just beam himself down and avoid all the soot,
Teleporting himself into parlors and living rooms—sparing his cardiac output.

Technology relieves him of his stress, since
It provides harmonic coalescence,
And he’ll continue leaving Yuletide presents
For the Christmas Eve quintessence.

But here’s where 3.0 gets somewhat tricky:
A grand request has come from Old Saint Nicky
That no fatty, excessive cholesterol snacks should be left (such as cookies and milk),
Preferring vegan snacks that give no gas
And drinks from healthy sources, such as grass.
So if lactose-intolerant Santa can stomach such stuff, then his digestion will go smooth as silk.

Those are all the details that we know
About the coming Christmas 3.0,
But the self-driving sleigh has now led all the way to some massively deep layoff talks.
Hence, even prior to the dreaded upgrade,
The reindeer feel that they had been betrayed,
Which has meant that the beasties of this and that species are thinking outside of the toy box.

Yes, Blitzen and the others worry they will be irrelevant –
Such thinking in the herd is now quite prevalent…
But Santa’s harsh advice to all the reindeer herd has been (quote): “Keep thinning:
For it’s sad to account, but accountants have found you irrelevant from the beginning.
With possible exceptions for Rudolph and Vixen,
Who got married, and now there are seven small fawns with their glowing red noses at loose in the kitchen."

Returning to the task at hand . . .
There’s upgrade fever in the land:
A study of its feasibility well underway,
The fundamental change could happen . . . any day. 

- Dick Hacken, 16 December 2016