Threadless t-shirt news: Important new scoring functionality!

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Apr 29 '05 by Threadless

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Important new scoring functionality!

Due to the extremely large number of submissions we've been receiving lately, we have implemented a new feature in the scoring system. Normally, each design gets 7 days to be scored. While this is still the case, if a design has received scores from 100 different people and those score's average is less than 1.5 - the design will be dropped from the running and will not be in for a full 7 days.

This allows us to approve more designs more often, giving everyone a fair, reasonable chance in the competition.

Jaycee on Apr 29 '05 at 9:57am

sounds like a plan batman!

never on Apr 29 '05 at 9:59am

great idea!!

eskimokiss on Apr 29 '05 at 10:00am

survival of the fittest aye

franx on Apr 29 '05 at 10:02am

i guess that's fair.

Shark_biscuit on Apr 29 '05 at 10:04am

This will help seperate the men from the boys i see, lol

eskimokiss on Apr 29 '05 at 10:06am

females submit too

cleanup on Apr 29 '05 at 10:11am

Tough love. :)

eskimokiss on Apr 29 '05 at 10:15am

wow, i've just noticed the amount of submissions up for voting just dropped from 400 odd to 295. has this anything to do with this new feature?

¥s on Apr 29 '05 at 10:15am

Nice

Survival of the fittest

franx on Apr 29 '05 at 10:38am

if a design is trashed after a 100 votes does it mean it's definitely not going to be printed?
some shirts with final scores well under 1.5 have been printed in the past.

skaw on Apr 29 '05 at 10:41am

franx - yea i guess not necessarily but it is HIGHLY unlikely.

Shirts with a score below 1.5 that have an extremely large amount of "I'd Buy It" requests - could be printed...

¥s on Apr 29 '05 at 10:44am

isn't this just gonna increase the resubmissions tenfold btw?

ej ronin on Apr 29 '05 at 10:46am

but does this also mean that when a shirt gets dropped, that the designer may improve it and resubmit it?

eskimokiss on Apr 29 '05 at 10:50am

... asks the re-submission king...

fairygurl06 on Apr 29 '05 at 10:52am

I think if no one scores it high, why would they buy it? I don't wanna waste time looking at crap shirts anyway.

skaw on Apr 29 '05 at 10:57am

i know i've scored shirts 0$ ... some are so ridiculously horrible that i would actually wear it :)

/me registeres "worstofthreadless.com"

skaw on Apr 29 '05 at 10:58am

regarding re-submissions -

we state very clearly that we do not allow duplicate submissions in the running ... and by slightly changing your design a little bit based on comments, we still treat it as a duplicate. if the concept didn't go over well the first time around, just try something new...

Scarp on Apr 29 '05 at 11:11am

No regrets duh....rules iz d rulez!

JJose on Apr 29 '05 at 11:50am

just would like to catch it right!! how many submissions each participant are allowed? is there any limitations that I kind to know by chance...... thankx

mrs egg on Apr 29 '05 at 12:10pm

Unfortunatly this solution may limit the type of people who vote on your design. Many design professionals etc don't log on all day. It could easily reach 100 votes without a diverse group getting to see it. 24 hours to reach 1.5 might be more fair.

Also, it seems odd and unfair to start this is the middle of the Loves Threadless competition. Then all the designs did not have same benefit of feedback etc. (I know final decision is by judges etc.) Do all the designs still make it to the judges?

Just some loopholes. I do however understand that Threadless deals with an enormous volume and had to change something!

mrs egg on Apr 29 '05 at 12:12pm

I feel bad for the shirts that slip through the cracks- I will probably start giving higher numbers to all but offensive t's just to keep them in the running.

mrs egg on Apr 29 '05 at 12:15pm

OK last comment-- has anyone noticed that a lot of shirts went from having a 7 day chance to having a 10 hour chance (or less) YIKES!

KEMMLER on Apr 29 '05 at 12:19pm

sounds good to me. Probably will help overall. Interestingly this will probably cause people to promote their designs very heavily early on to break 1.5, (or better- just get 100 friends to vote a 5 right away) then later on the design might very well drop below 1.5...

Roboshobo on Apr 29 '05 at 12:26pm

finally

TimTheSloth on Apr 29 '05 at 12:45pm

This is a great idea. Take out the garbage.

graphicairlines on Apr 29 '05 at 1:24pm

exciting~~~
I will do my best.

ej ronin on Apr 29 '05 at 1:31pm

hey at least you know that for every 100 ppl that vote if your shirt is there, then you are atleast above 1.5.... maybe they should take it to 100 ppl cut below a 1.5, for every 200 below a 1.75, and at 400 votes cut below a 2

ej ronin on Apr 29 '05 at 1:35pm

Eskimokiss - Im working on cutinghtem back if you havent noticed, thanks kindly :P....

cintrao on Apr 29 '05 at 1:58pm

Life Sucks, the corporate sense of justice arrived, be Afraid very afraid...

medeatica on Apr 29 '05 at 3:08pm

I wanna cry!

Jaycee on Apr 29 '05 at 3:09pm

i don't think you need a staggered system. this one cut off should be enough.

Robsoul on Apr 29 '05 at 3:17pm

it would be better if you filtered some of the submissions, some shouldn't even get to the scoring stage, maybe you already do that. I respect everyones work but some people have never used a computer, designed, can't illustrate, at a glance you can tell but I guess beauty is in the eye of the beholder. do what you need to do, but please just get rid of those heather shirts... please ;-)

skaw on Apr 29 '05 at 3:27pm

yea, we already do that

TylerTee on Apr 29 '05 at 3:28pm

Yes, good idea.

travis76 on Apr 29 '05 at 3:40pm

maybe....although alot of people who rate give everyone but thier own a zero- no matter what, so you have to hope that enough honest, unbiased people rate your stuff in time. sorry if this message duplicates, there was some server errors, yo.

VideoGames1975 on Apr 29 '05 at 3:41pm

Sounds good to me.

Seeing as I just got my first design approved, I hope It doesn't just drop off the face of the earth before I get some good comments. :)

travis76 on Apr 29 '05 at 3:44pm

maybe some kind of filter that limits the number of zeros you can dish out in a day, or that keeps track of how people vote on average....maybe you already do that part, i dunno. maybe too intrusive, but something has to change.... something that comes onscreen and tells fucktards 'sorry, you've got a reputation for voting negatively, please respect the voting process and judge accordingly.' or some other sarcastic pleasantry.

eskimokiss on Apr 29 '05 at 4:40pm

ej ronin: I have noticed dude ;)
And your designs are improving a hell of alot too :)

skaw on Apr 29 '05 at 8:16pm

the fact that people score tons of 0's has already been taken into account - that is why the avg of 1.5 as being the avg that is dropped after 100 votes is so low - because everyone scores designs quite low. You have to have a pretty damn good design to get anything over a 2.7 and that really doesn't sound like that great of a score when you think it's out of 5

fade2black on Apr 29 '05 at 8:37pm

Maybe get rid of zeros. I mean a design should warrant a 1 just for being posted. The highest score I've seen is a 3.7, and out of the all the designs you have on file I doubt you have a 4. That kinda proves that the scoring system is harsh. Since we all are rated on the same scale, it's fair and it doesn't really matter. It just looks bad. I think getting rid of the zeros would help. Maybe even simplifying it to buy, or no buy.

travis76 on Apr 29 '05 at 8:56pm

yeah, i think i got a 3.7 on something. i was proud.

travis76 on Apr 29 '05 at 9:15pm

3.27 ...sorry i'm wasting threads! :/

RaeKuusou on Apr 29 '05 at 9:25pm

hmmmm. this leaves a bad taste in my mouth. i mean, i understand WHY you guys need to do this, but it just seems kind of harsh. perhaps removing them after 200 votes or three days with an average under 1.5 would give more people a chance to see them. i mean after all, i've 5+$ shirts that comments ahead of me have ripped apart, so what if every one who hates it get there first?

;)

VideoGames1975 on Apr 29 '05 at 9:48pm

prehaps a karma type system needs to be added.

worth1000 uses one that if your karma drops below 0, then your votes don't count toward anything except improving your karma (if you start to vote correctly...) the people with good karma, their votes go toward the score for the image.

if you vote all low and high with no real judgement (or fairness), your karma gets cut... if you vote with a nice wide range (a mix of any vote scale, 3-5, 0-3, or even 1-5 with a nice balance), then your karma increases. Everyone's karma caps off at one point and you continue to vote correctly to keep your karma levels up.

on W1k this is done over the course of each contest... here it could be done over the course of every 100 votes you submit.

just a thought as to forcing better voting habbits.
:)

cool_breeze on Apr 29 '05 at 10:52pm

Such an awesome idea I'm surprised it was not implemented earlier!

EvilCarrotChomp on Apr 29 '05 at 11:28pm

That's a relief. I hate to say this but I stopped voting completely because I couldn't handle sifting through all of the designs (many of which I don't enjoy). I didn't think it was fair to only vote for the designs I liked or vote against the designs I didn't like. I think a lot of design submissions (since the two contests opened) have lost voters due to the crazy-large amount. I stopped looking at the regular non-contest designs. I just couldn't keep up.

kingoftokelau on Apr 30 '05 at 12:36am

How does threadless decide which shirts to print? I noticed a lot of the finished ones with average scores of 3.xx not printed while some with 2 or even 1.xx have been printed. Seems a bit unfair. I really love a lot of the ones who received high scores but have not been printed. I guess this new system is fair.

gumnuthead on Apr 30 '05 at 3:47am

Absoutely agree with the above comment!

Strawbs on Apr 30 '05 at 4:30am

I think it was extremely unfair to introduce this half way through a Loves Threadless competition. I have told all my friends and collegues that they have 7 days to vote. Knowing most of them they would leave it to the last day. Had I known that this might happen, I would have got them all to vote in hour 1 (never mind day 1).
The idea is good though. Just not in mid competition!!!

What we do need is a time from which our designs are up for voting. If we know this in advanced, we have a fighting chance of getting the right people to look at it and vote to keep their favourites in the running.

Last thing, I got an email on Tuesday saying my design was up for voting, but is no where to be found. Has anybody else had this problem?

TheDesignCat on Apr 30 '05 at 5:59am

What if the same person votes for the same design 100 times and gives a zero every time? I hope that's not possible. Some dishonest people could do that to drop other people's designs out.:(

reflectric on Apr 30 '05 at 8:52am

if they could do that why hasnt every single design had full votes designcat? not the way it works

takethetrain on Apr 30 '05 at 9:04am

the karma idea sounds really nice.

Strawbs on Apr 30 '05 at 9:07am

TheDesignCat, judging by the average scores or a lot of good designs, I think there are people out there like that anyway. This is just going to work to their advantage.

I know that you guys at Threadless are really busy, but judging by the amount of visits and custom this website gets would it not be worth taking on another pair of hands, getting a bigger server and going back to the old way of working? Just an idea that might keep us day dreamers dreaming that oneday we might get a shirt printed. If we can't dream of the prize then what is the point in entering?

Having my design taken down from voting without warning just really cheesed me off. I wasn't expecting to win, but I wasn't expected to be dropped before the 7 days was up. I think a bit of warning was in order as others who enetered in to the same competition earlier in the month got their full 7 days worth. And if they got friends like mine who vote at the last minute, they have that unfair advantage.

PLEASE THREADLESS, BEFORE YOU CHANGE RULES AGAIN, MAKE SURE ALL PARTICPANTS KNOW A FEW DAYS PRIOR TO THE CHANGE TO GIVE EVERYONE THE SAME ADVANTAGES.

¥s on Apr 30 '05 at 10:21am

Strawbs, if you count on your friends and family just to get your score above 1.5 maybe your shirts just aint good enough, no offence

I think this 1.5 rule will motivate people to do a better job on their design in the end. It might keep some people away from submitting here, but then it just not the time and place for them

So take it as a challenge to kick your creative skills a step futher so it will make it next time instead of bitch to Threadless about it, they run the joint and make the rules.

Naboolou on Apr 30 '05 at 10:35am

I checked my design this morning and it was over 100 people and still running so I figured all was good. I just checked it again and, a few people later, and my entry is done!

I didn't know at any time after 100 people that your score drops under 1.5 that you are immediately eliminated! That's a bit retarded!!

Strawbs on Apr 30 '05 at 10:44am

Threadless do a fantastic job and I am not knocking that. I suppose I just have sour grapes because what I think was one of my best designs was knocked out. I do think that they could have introduced this to the new comepition when it started and leave the current competitions to finish on the rules they started on.

I apologise to all for my whining, but as I siad... just a few sour grapes.

craeon on Apr 30 '05 at 10:58am

Time to step up the game kids.

I_Think_Im_2D on Apr 30 '05 at 12:40pm

YES! THANK YOU!!!

ej ronin on Apr 30 '05 at 1:14pm

I dunno, I can see other designers banding or at least giving low scores to other designs just to get them out of the way. Im paranoid by nature anyway so...maybe its me. I think the 1.5 rule is a good start to a great idea, but maybe it needs slight tuning. As of yet I can offer no possible tweaks to it, but I'll think on it.

EvilCarrotChomp on Apr 30 '05 at 4:43pm

Regardless of this new system, I think contest submissions suffered in scoring due to the volume of submissions. This scoring system reduces that number. Hopefully reducing designs which have been submitted to contests and aren't even related to the topic.

skaw on Apr 30 '05 at 6:12pm

For what it's worth, I'd like to let you all know a couple things.

1) Before implementing this process, we ran a query on our database to compare the avg score after 100 votes vs the final avg score after a full 7 days and the average has never varied by more than 0.2. This means a design with a 1.5 at 100 votes is highly unlikely (it's never happend before) to get anything higher than a 1.7.

2) A lot of people are concerned about people giving a lot of 0's. This has always happened and was taken into account when implementing this system.

3) As for not giving any notice, we did allude to this new functionality in previous blog posts - we're sorry to those who were completely unaware.

punk_prodigy on Apr 30 '05 at 7:04pm

good idea...really streamlines the whole scoring process and makes it easier for people to see designs that have a realistic chance of winning.

ej ronin on Apr 30 '05 at 8:35pm

I sitll like VideoGames1975 idea of a karma system to run along side it.

VideoGames1975 on Apr 30 '05 at 8:48pm

Skaw,

thanks for that reply explaining things.
Your #1 of "what it's worth" (above) makes me feel better about having my first submitted designbooted @ 1.2 avg. with 101 votes... I get the point that it would have never gone above 1.4 ... so I guess it's good that it got dropped.

atleast I understand it better now.

---------------------

I do have a question though... if I may.
if printing judgement is based somewhat on how many people click the "I'd buy" then how does that effect an image that has far fewer votes? I guess it's a percentage of over all votes that said "I'd buy", is that correct?

I'm all for the changes to get the lower quality designs out of the way... I'm just trying to fully understand how this works.

thanks.
:)

Spusel on May 01 '05 at 12:19am

stupendous

skaw on May 01 '05 at 1:21am

VideoGames1975 - when looking at designs that have a high number of "I'd buy it request" we look at the number of I'd buyit's in comparison to the number of scores. So we see that 50% of the people that scored the design gave it an "I'd buy it" and that is extremely good. So dropping the design after 100 really has no effect over that functionality.

franx on May 01 '05 at 10:27am

i think this might get people to try harder but how about some positive reinforcement for submissions that score high too. something small like receiving a point for every 3 submissions that score over 2.7, or something. i think that would get me to try even harder than just the fear of getting dropped for scoring under 1.5.
just an idea.

VideoGames1975 on May 01 '05 at 10:49am

Skaw - that's exactly what I thought.
sounds great.

thanks for the quick reply.

skaw on May 01 '05 at 11:44am

that's a great idea franx, we will definitely think about that...

lsmc88 on May 01 '05 at 6:31pm

I think this is an excellent idea because I put up a design that I regret and ended up getting so much negative comments that I wanted it to be taken off after the second day. I think this is great so that it saves people from all the cold people on this site.

travis76 on May 02 '05 at 7:50am

yeah, i love getting cold, nasty responses from people, then clicking on thier name and seeing that they've been a member for a day, or better yet, a member for a long time and only ever submitted one tee, if any.
-don't bust chops until you've laid some stuff out on the table-
i like the karma system too. the relentlessly negative kids should be kept in check. if i see a crap shirt, i can ususally find a positive thing about it-whether it's concept, color or something, before i start with the constructive criticism..but that's just me.
true too, i think the weeding out will improve scoring, because i never even get around to scoring so many out of the herd...

travis76 on May 02 '05 at 7:52am

p.s. lsmc88 -
you're in junior high?
you've got alot of clean good stuff- better than alot of these complaining design school kids. keep tryin'

takethetrain on May 02 '05 at 8:59am

wow, franx had a really great idea--i am glad you guys are considering it!

msskittles on May 02 '05 at 4:54pm

kick ass
u guys are geniuses

Robsoul on May 02 '05 at 7:29pm

I am the first victim. I suck.

Piss on an electrical toaster before midnight you savage bastards... just kidding.

craeon on May 02 '05 at 8:03pm

I hope I never get anything below a 1.5.

MrDomino on May 02 '05 at 11:47pm

I am of the opinion that all art is a lifetime challenge of your conviction. If you really love what you do, if you are unwilling to ever accept that your work is good enough, then you want people to be honest and straightforward with what you show. It is an internal challenge so to speak.

If having your design dropped at Threadless makes you give up creating art, you're in this for the wrong reasons. Adversity pushes you to excel.

I'm all for it, and please people, if I ever submit something that is worthy of a zero, let me know.

mezo on May 03 '05 at 8:24am

Having artwork dropped is the best bad critique Threadless can offer....and, really, this site NEEDS to have the sub-par designs weeded out.
Tough love.

noralf on May 03 '05 at 9:48am

That means when 100 of your competitors has given you zero points you are out! When I participate I should not be able to give my competitors scores!

noralf on May 03 '05 at 9:55am

That means when 100 of your competitors has given you zero points you are out! When I participate I should not be able to give my competitors scores!

xiv on May 03 '05 at 9:58am

The new system is great. Alot of designs will be dropped real fast, expecially the ones that look like they were done in like 2 min in ms paint.

But something needs to be done about the people who go around and just trash other peoples work. If your going to comment, dont be an ass and say immature stuff like "that looks like shit" or "you suck at drawing". Dont comment unless your going to give constructive critizism.

sonofvega on May 03 '05 at 1:15pm

Ive summited 2 designs and still havent seen them up. :(

Ronlewhorn on May 03 '05 at 1:24pm

GREAT PLAN. I"M SICK OF SORTING THROUGH CRAP.

vitox on May 03 '05 at 2:12pm

Ok, perfect idea!!

cpetruk on May 03 '05 at 3:18pm

that's a sound idea...

MrDomino on May 03 '05 at 4:31pm

There's no point in negatively voting other people in the same contest. A panel of judges determines who wins the contest not the Threadless voting. And, unless I'm mistaken, the criteria for what gets printed is set. So you don't "compete" per se with other people who have designs up at the same time. Either your submission meets the criteria at the end of voting or it doesn't. Its relation to other work is moot.

If people get all their friends/family to vote high for them, so be it. It's cheating as far as I'm concerned but there's no policing it really. I'd like to believe that good design will merit a good score on its own rights. If not, we've all seen the headhunters in here searching for new talent. Good design attracts them at least, and I'd like to think that creates opportunity for those that deserve it.

Ava Adore on May 03 '05 at 7:34pm

great. it will hopefully get rid of the crap designs wasting space

VideoGames1975 on May 04 '05 at 10:00am

this is all fine and dandy... seems like it's working great.

however... maybe we could add 2 more things.

1. an "I'd buy it" button to the designs for AFTER the image drops off. An image may drop below 1.5 before I get to tell the staff that I would buy it, no matter the score.

2. a "submit for re-review" button, for images that got past the rules for one reason or another... (more then 4 colors for example)

karoline. on May 04 '05 at 5:53pm

i like this, awesome :D

mrs egg on May 04 '05 at 6:02pm

Man, I had one dropping right away and was dealing with it fine-- until today, when I saw some of the crap making it past the scoring system...maybe I need to get all of my friends and family to vote too....hmmmmm

rollback on May 06 '05 at 12:34pm

it will keep people form thumbing threw the so-so
grrrrreat

tunastar on May 06 '05 at 11:48pm

hell yeah :]

Naboolou on May 07 '05 at 9:49am

i've noticed that since there are so many fewer designs making the cutoff that the remaining designs are getting tons more votes.

400 votes was pretty decent before but now I'm getting 500+ votes with 2+ days remaining.

tabithaholm on May 07 '05 at 9:54pm

What the hell?! There are people are voting 0's on everything just to be spiteful? I am devastated. Why would anyone go around sabotaging everyone else's stuff...thats a really sad comment on the caliber of people on here.

Shame on anyone doing this.

RaeKuusou on May 08 '05 at 6:32pm

the system sure seems to be working....

i check out threadless pretty much everyday (addiction, yes) and normally there are about 20-30 new designs. today there were only two. i wonder if all the others were really that bad....

letsgokathryn on May 09 '05 at 3:29pm

good idea that's what they do with game submissions at new grounds

2 days later

JOHNNYMON SKATE on May 11 '05 at 7:47pm

I'M NEW HERE, PLACE LOOKS AWESOME! I'M FULL OF SOCIAL OBSERVATIONS CONVERTED INTO AN INKED IMAGINATION OF VISUAL MASTERBATIONARY SATISFACTION ONLY KNOWN BY THE PEOPLE WHO VISIT THIS SITE. I WILL BE SENDING SOME OF MY STUFF SOON, PLEASE LET ME KNOW "SHOULD I STAY OR SHOULD I GO?"
I CAN LIVE FOREVER- ON A TEE SHIRT.
TEE SHIRTS FOR ALL MY FRIENDS.
MILLIONS OF TEE SHIRTS, TEE SHIRTS FOR FREE.
JOHNNYMON SKATE SEZ: LATER BRUDDA.

Oliver Monroe on May 12 '05 at 4:24am

ook understandable

TimTheSloth on May 12 '05 at 11:56am

I'm gonna take a guess ahead of time and say you should go.

label on May 12 '05 at 1:13pm

I think its great! Keep it up you guys!

JOHNNYMON SKATE on May 13 '05 at 10:42am

AHEAD OF TIME IS A BAD PLACE TO BE MR. SLOTHMAN, STAYING IN THE PRESENT AND LEARNING FROM YOUR PAST ONLY MAKES FOR GREAT CONCLUSIONS OF THE VISUAL AND AUDIO INFLUENCES WE ALLOW OURSELFS TO CONSUME AND SPAT OUT LATER AS EITHER AN OPINION, A PIECE OF ART, OR JUST A MINDLESS COMMENT IN A COMMENT BOX.
PS. DONT LET THE BUG BEARS BITE!!!!!!!
LOOK IT UP,
JOHNNYMON SKATE.

Jaycee on May 13 '05 at 10:45am

maybe if you talk in caps, people will think you're cool.

JOHNNYMON SKATE on May 13 '05 at 1:10pm

sorry did not know about the caps thing. I do this because i could read it better, glasses firmly in place now, old dude here sorry about my weaknesses. I'll try to be kind, canub2?
and people should stop "thinking" so much and start" knowing" something.

susansng on May 13 '05 at 10:34pm

Great tee for teenagers

3 days later

shimala on May 17 '05 at 1:23am

OMG people are blind!

If we get another customer service email asking why their design can no longer be scored I'm going to start crushing skulls...
well not really but you can imagine if I did.

¥s on May 17 '05 at 6:09am

hahahaha

punkitaly on May 17 '05 at 11:29pm

Hey you Yanks this is a London Chic here and some of ya would not give an apple and pears about this Tee but I think it Rocks..

Come on wake up and stop drinkin so much lame coffee!!!!

Punkitaly

punkitaly on May 17 '05 at 11:32pm

VOTE THIS TEE.
VOTE THIS TEE
VOTE THE ROCKING TEE...TIS THIS ONE..

JOHNNYMON SKATE on May 18 '05 at 8:54am

Hey punk girl,
what tee are we voting on?

punkitaly on May 19 '05 at 3:53am

For the people in Europe i is Highly unfair.
We get the response from threadless in the middle of the night, hence by the time we check in the morning most people ave already voted on it... but all the people including the artist who might give it good score, hve little chance to better the average...
HIGHLY UNFAIR

hhubner on May 19 '05 at 9:50am

I don´t get it. HAVE A TEE THAT SCORED 1.5 AND WAS DROPPED DOWN!!! Why?

grayehound on May 19 '05 at 12:02pm

Do Europeans have lower standards than Americans in their design choice? Then why would they vote higher on something everyone else already agrees sucks? Would no more than 5% of the votes really affect the scoring if it's already below 1.5? I don't get it...why is this unfair?

GLIESE on May 20 '05 at 4:23am

I think this new way of scoring the tees sucks.
plain and simple, much better the old way.
I back the fact of it being unfair.
..
p.s. besides sometimes i do think that americans have lower standards of taste..

Scarlet Fever on May 20 '05 at 7:40am

good idea

9 days later

jennywan on May 30 '05 at 2:23am

Me sumbitted a design on a FRIDAY night at GMT +8 and it was only approved on MONDAY morning - and the voting system stopped on MONDAY afternoon.

What the hell is going on indeed....

eskimokiss on May 30 '05 at 7:59am

With regards to being disadvantaged due to time differences across the globe, I'm in Aust. and I've yet to have any of my designs pulled prematurely (thank god). I think I've submitted 4 since the introduction of this rule.

emsef on May 30 '05 at 12:03pm

I have to admit the new way of scoring is unfair due to time zones across the world.

emsef on May 30 '05 at 12:05pm

And it seems tees are beign dropped after 101 votes rather than 100.

2 days later

Down10 on Jun 02 '05 at 3:13am

Perhaps it should be bumped up to 72 hours...

Down10 on Jun 02 '05 at 3:15am

Or better yet, increments:

0.5 average score - dropped after 24 hours
1.0 average score - dropped after 48 hours
1.5 average score - dropped after 72 hours

11 days later

artologist on Jun 13 '05 at 11:17am

This new system sucks. I got my approval notice and my design had already been removed before I could promote it. Stupid. Even the banner that came in the promotion pack said 100 Scores avg. 1.1. Why send me an acceptance or promotion pack at all if I can't promote the damn thing. 100 votes is simply too small of a number to rule as a consensus for the whole freakin planet! Get real.

artologist on Jun 13 '05 at 11:20am

Also if you revert or adjust the system, which you should, all shirts dismissed early due to the disfunctionality of the current system should be reprocessed and given their due.

AlecGrieco on Jun 13 '05 at 11:25am

I like this...now I know with in a day whether I have a chance in hell.

MDepot on Jun 13 '05 at 2:05pm

The system is fine. The stakes are higher now...more submissions.

3 days later

Tuozzoli on Jun 16 '05 at 9:35pm

I think it's pretty stupid. My shirt had a hundred votes within 3 hours of it being approved and it was knocked off... 100 votes isn't enough. Especially when it seems you have a plethora of folks giving bad scores out for kicks. I mean you are giving a chance for designers to get their t-shirts printed?? WE should be able to have a little time to find our perspective buyers. I don't know anything about business sales or numbers, but how many out of 100 views are you supposed to attract? I would think your new system would discourage submissions - maybe that is what you are trying to do, eh?

GetFunky on Jun 17 '05 at 12:49am

it's odd that so many of the people complaning about their designs getting knocked out of the voting process because of low ratings (1.5) give the designs they vote on, an average score less then that.

The instant that you make something (in art, etc. creative endevors in general) you're not exacty subjective. You think it's brilliant, and a masterpiece, a groundbreaking achievement... prosterity will remember you for it, .. etc... ... at that moment you're biased. Mabey what you need to do is .. dare I say.. step away from it.....or get a second opinion.... mabey submit it the next day.

It could be that you are submitting it right away, have high hopes for it, and are disapointed. You don't necessarily get the same way about other's work,..hence the low scores that you have given out.

try stepping away from it, and see if you still feel the same way about the artwork the next day. (T-shirt designs I have not submitted, but artwork I have done quite a bit of, I find this helps.....oh,.. and any critisim you tend to take better....)

good luck, I hope it helps.
oh, and read the book Art & Fear, because it's awesome :)

bottlesandcans on Jun 17 '05 at 1:15am

20 percent at most off all the submissions are wearable in public..im down with harsher voting.

2 days later

namsterdamus on Jun 19 '05 at 3:42am

Yes I've been emails from loads of friends saying that the shirts went up for like 2 to 4 hours and then voting for it stopped so obviously it can't score high if they cut it from the abiltiy to score. What is up with that? I sent them an email about it and all they responded with was to state the fact that the score is low. OK , thanks for the info. HAHAHA, whay can't the bug be that our submission stays up for voting accidentally for a few weeks and always moves up to the top of the list, why can't bugs every be in our favor.

bottlesandcans on Jun 19 '05 at 4:01am

screw that...

bottlesandcans on Jun 19 '05 at 4:02am

harsher voting is always good,,,

Treshe on Jun 19 '05 at 6:21am

skaw said it:
1) Before implementing this process, we ran a query on our database to compare the avg score after 100 votes vs the final avg score after a full 7 days and the average has never varied by more than 0.2. This means a design with a 1.5 at 100 votes is highly unlikely (it's never happend before) to get anything higher than a 1.7.

so just accept that your design probably would not have scored higher anyway.
and now there is more room for the better designs.

Pifman on Jun 19 '05 at 11:23am

Wow Treshe, that's actually pretty comforting and makes sense.

namsterdamus on Jun 19 '05 at 11:53pm

so your saying if it avcerages 1.5 in an hour then they cut it regardless immediately.

shimala on Jun 20 '05 at 12:06am

no, time has nothing to do with it....

if at anytime your score drops below 1.5(yes, your score might show as 1.5 on the site but is really is 1.496 and is rounded up for display) after 100 votes your design will be dropped from the running.

bottlesandcans on Jun 20 '05 at 12:14am

thank god

21 days later

BusCaptain on Jul 11 '05 at 10:28pm

My new submission is one of the ones that got screwed. It was posted and removed last SUNDAY. I didn't even get a chance to vote for it. This is kinda unfair, but whatever. What can I do?

little_hobbit_feet on Jul 11 '05 at 10:30pm

Hey, maybe this should be a sticky post. Or frequently bumped.

Iwouldbejosh on Jul 11 '05 at 11:06pm

I think a lot of people think that this is unfair, but I haven't seen any designs get kicked out of running that would have done much better if they had stayed for a week....

SEPTIC on Jul 11 '05 at 11:33pm

WHAT ??!!! whatever I will sub everything in my head tho.

johnny twotone on Jul 13 '05 at 3:33pm

Um... my first submission ever to threadless just got approved and then kickd out in 4 hours. Yeah, FOUR HOURS. All the comments I got on it were pretty good... But damn. Four hours. I guess there must have been a lot of people who hated it.

techwarman on Jul 13 '05 at 3:38pm

I think it's a good idea, keep on truckin'

johnny twotone on Jul 13 '05 at 3:39pm

Well it was a good motivator to get shot down so quickly. Makes me want to go back to the drawing board!

blucow on Jul 13 '05 at 3:44pm

Just a tip, text is looked down upon by most people. Try to keep to using as little as possible, unless you can get it to really work.

elgen on Jul 13 '05 at 8:03pm

what if people just start voting 0 for new designs submitted? that way the remaining ones can get the benefit of people recently visiting the competition that will only see the remaining ones?

Luke... on Jul 15 '05 at 5:53pm

well this changes my attitude of this contest...
i am new to this site, and i think it is really cool...
but my method of designing/ submitting for threadless was just to get the concept out as quickly as possible...i mean i havent spent more than 15min. on a design.....it is just for fun anyway....i do it on my breaks.....but with this introduction of scoring drop-outs, and the raise in prize$, i will definitely take the contest more seriously, and spend an appropriate amount of time/energy/thought/talent to my threadless submissions...hopefully everyone will do the same...

2 days later

firetrail on Jul 17 '05 at 7:53pm

ok rules are rules. But, for fairness sake, keep those ugly design out from the gallery, it is not fair if someone will submit above those ugly ones and get dumped, i hope so.

firetrail on Jul 17 '05 at 7:55pm

it is also an advantage for those who can submit with so much sincerety to their works, i guess it is a survival of the fittest...let's rock!

8 days later

ugik-munky on Jul 26 '05 at 2:36am

I got 157 point and my submission kicked out, what happen? 157?not 100. I dont understand and I confusing man! HOW?

bombshield on Jul 26 '05 at 2:45am

I've had a design booted out because of this new rule and I've also had 5 different people contact me about it saying how much they wished it to be printed. Go figure. However, I think this is good.. for it will make people focus more and develop a design further before submitting their half-arsed robot sketch they did in 3rd period french class.

patheticwaste on Jul 26 '05 at 9:02am

Perhaps there should be another control in place to eliminate accounts of people who GIVE an average score of less than 1.5 to shirts after 100 votes. There are enough appealing designs on this site that nobody who is serously evaluating them should be scoring lower than that.

I score honestly on this site, but I've wondered if there's a way of tracking people who will vote zeros specifically on shirts that might be stiff competition for them. Perhaps I'm just feeling insecure about my 1.49... yeah that's it. I've gotta make a shirt that nobody can eff with, that's all.

drumbum on Jul 26 '05 at 9:16am

Patheticwaste, people vote 0's for a reason...nothings wrong with that. Every single shirt printed on this site has a good portion of 0 votes, but the really great shirts still have enough people voting highly of it because it's awesome.

Don't come complaining because your shirt got kicked because of the 1.5 rule...it's obviously been voted poorly for a reason. 1.49 is a tough break though.

All im saying is that if 0's were eliminated, 1's would take their place. The 0 is there for a reason ;)

babyrory on Jul 27 '05 at 7:24am

The new system, leaves the competition open for 10 hours? What about countries that might just be sleeping over those 10 hours? Went to sleep, my design was accepted. Woke up, it had been rejected. Not bitter. At all.

little_hobbit_feet on Jul 27 '05 at 9:26am

10 hours, what? It can get taken down in one, if 100 people vote fast enough (which, with the growing Threadless community, is entirely possible.)

jschugel on Jul 27 '05 at 9:39am

i think the new rule does not allow enough time for anyone other than the drumbums (with 3,000 votes cast under their belt) to vote so what you end up with is a small minority of like-minded people making all the decisions. i didn't even have a shot at voting for my own submission. lame.

babyrory on Jul 28 '05 at 3:16am

10 hours, unless you live in the US or somewhere else in the world and stay up way past your bedtime, you dont even get to see any of the designs before theyre taken off. It kinda excludes a lot of voters.

Iwouldbejosh on Jul 28 '05 at 4:52am

I had a design drop out of the running in less than 4 hours. I submitted it, took a nap, noticed that it was up, went to vote, noticed that it was done being scored before I got to vote, cried, then said "screw it" and dived into my giant vault of money like Scrooge McDuck.

blenderbox88 on Jul 28 '05 at 8:53am

Question, if the design is taken out, is the thumbnail still showing, but when you click on it, it goes to a blank page, or does threadless contact you and tell you that your design sucks. I'm only asking because I posted a shirt yesterday, and now the thumbnail takes me to a blank page, when yesterday it was fine.

Operator on Jul 28 '05 at 9:14am

I think its time for this rule to be changed considering the new population of Threadless, meaning, the sheer number of new people that are here now. How about... giving a design 24 hours or 500 votes to break the 1.5 threshold?

Economos on Jul 28 '05 at 9:53am

good idea operator... i was thinking about something along the same lines... a minimum of 24 hours should be a definite change... i do think thre are a lot of 0's being given. i score a lot of shirts, but i rarely give a 0. i will give almost anyone a 1 just for the effort if it is not revolting, rude, or just a slogan with no art on it. i know a lot of people give 0's but i can't bring myself to give them b/c i know how hard it is to put yourself out there for other's crits.

another thing i thought of on the scoring thing is that when it was implemented, 100 votes was a pretty good percentage of all the votes you were going to get (1/5 or 1/6), but now submissions are getting 1000, 1100, 1200 votes - therefore, up the number of votes on the 1.5 rule... 300 votes or something like that. this will give more people a chance to even see the submissions that are being dropped.

RockStarNeil on Jul 29 '05 at 1:44pm

yea, good idea

2 days later

Mr.Gorsky on Jul 31 '05 at 1:48pm

no entendi,

Operator on Jul 31 '05 at 2:33pm

denied again. this is starting to get old

Daniel James Diggle on Jul 31 '05 at 5:21pm

Haha, i think its an excellent idea, even though due to it, my last submission just spectaculaly bombed out.

at least it keeps the crap out!

4 days later

1k34 on Aug 04 '05 at 5:38pm

it does not necessarily keep the crap out if you look at a lot of the shit still running. you know there are people that'll vote zero just to knock out some competition. yes, survival of the fittest but not survival in designing.

i think the judging should be left to the judges.

i_twirl_batons on Aug 04 '05 at 11:29pm

operator- some of these don't get 500 votes :\

but i ilke the idea of like 24 hours
because those emails from threadless always hit my inbox a day later

:\

so wait. can we get a clear explanation on how scoring works from the official threadless guys?

2 days later

pamzylove on Aug 07 '05 at 8:44am

I'm sorry to inform you that your submission "Shout Out Louds T shirt"
has been taken out of the running because it has received
less than a 1.5 average score after 100 votes.

For more information as to why we do this, please check this out!
http://www.threadless.com/news/1236/Important_new_scoring_functionality!

Don't get discouraged though! Keep on submitting!

Threadless.com
Earth's Best Tshirts
http://www.threadless.com/
-----------------------------------------------
honestly it was my first post that was excepted and it wasn't even on the site for 24 hours..
not even!!!
I seen it posted around 11pm date aug 6 I believe, and now its the day after 9:42am
WTF really this is very discouraging :S

Dust! on Aug 07 '05 at 9:04am

I'm bored.
if your average score is less than 1.5 after 100 votes, it will be not printed.
where is the problem?
What do n't you understand?

Superbinky on Aug 07 '05 at 9:06am

mine was dumped too, but apparently i had copyrighted material on it, oops.

Tofu_Rok on Aug 07 '05 at 9:34am

You didn't even create that vector yourself as well, its avaliable for free to download.

notsocoolnowarewe on Aug 09 '05 at 2:10am

what the fuck......i got so close!!!! a 1.49?!!!! .01 away from staying in.....it should be like if your like.1 or more away not that close it's not cool

schaghticoke_ndn on Aug 09 '05 at 2:25am

hey NUTSO try suckin it up. I can't wait til you hit the working world and the art directors kick your designs back to you 5x or just use it for kindling! Besides think of something more original than a friggin flatliner... gheeezus looks like you took the design out of a medical (trade) magazine. The system works... even when you don't.

2 days later

womenandart on Aug 11 '05 at 8:44pm

hey it kinda bugged me at first but hey... ill be a good sport about it. and plus... it makes those who win even more proud! ill just have to work harder

czyz on Aug 13 '05 at 9:31am

When I submitted my design around 12:30AM Friday, the submission page said, "Remember, it will take 4-8 days for us to approve your submission once you submit it." I figured I'd have 4 days to get ready to promote my design.

With that in mind, I was very surprised when I checked my email later in the day and found that my design submission had been approved at 11:00AM. And then surprised again when my submission was already taken out of the running at 3:30PM (scores: 102, Average Score: 1.26).

Obviously, people either disliked or were offended by my design (or simply want to wear brighter colors or like apples). That's the way things went, and I don't have an issue with the result.

But the experience was a big letdown. I didn't expect to win a prize, but had hoped to receive some constructive comments. Maybe if low-scoring works were taken out of the running after 24 hours the experience would be more satisfying for the designer?

J-Ray on Aug 13 '05 at 3:54pm

Here's a thought: People who give out an average of 1.5 or less should have their accounts deleted.

beachic177 on Aug 14 '05 at 2:37am

Damn! I think my shirt had like a 1 hour chance, cmon, I didn't even have time to publicize myself yet people! I don't mind the rule, but can't we make it at least 24 hours? I think that is more than fair!

Iwouldbejosh on Aug 14 '05 at 3:07am

I don't have any problem with that system except for the fact that the voting is really inconsistent. Some things make it past 100 votes that shouldn't while other designs get shut out almost immediately when they should get a chance to be seen by more people. But that's life....

3 days later

Purplesealpup on Aug 18 '05 at 12:52am

Not so sure I like this voting. I see some pretty stupid t-shirts Stil in -- must have alot of friends! And the Good ones Gone!
There was not enough time to view and rate all of them either. That could be why the ones that listed last never got any decent ratings. Be Fair at least.

shimala on Aug 18 '05 at 1:24am

J-Ray - I have an average of 1.1928. I guess my account should be deleted and I'm fired

Iwouldbejosh on Aug 18 '05 at 2:12am

I think that I ultimately just really like my idea that there could be some sort of area where people could view the designs that dropped out the running seperate from the regular designs. It would be educational in that it would show what people definitely did not like at first glance. I also think that we should always be able to click the "I'd buy it!" box at any time, even if the design is downvoted. I think that would make it more democratic. As it stands right now, if I wanted to, I could get a few hundred of my internet friends to downvote a design to get it kicked out of the running and ruin it's chance of being printed. I wouldn't do that, but it is very possible.

glauconlab on Aug 19 '05 at 6:06am

i've been kiked in 4 hours, and didn't even had the chance to promote it...
going along whit beachic177 or mrs egg and the opinion of the 24 hours idea.
rules are rules but it doens't mean that there good or that can't be changed.

glauconlab on Aug 19 '05 at 9:43am

in my previous post i was only bord with the idea that i did't have the chance to promote the tee's. But now i'm really angry because there's no warning, or something like that, (i've checked it again) during the submiting of the tee's. its a question of ferness for every designer.
i wouldt submit the tee's, or designed it, if i imagine that couldn't promot it.
if you are propossing a competition you have to be prepared for all situations, dont waste people time.
threadless.com is a very good idea don't louse it.
it's not only fare it's also not legal.

2 days later

caro.d on Aug 22 '05 at 1:35am

This rule is really hard!! Especially with the time shift. Here twice that my participations have been taken out of the running without I being able to even put the banner or to promotte my work !!

I however have many positive comments, but much of people votes zero rather than to pass their turn!

They is very discouraging from not letting live 7 days the design !!

howlynart on Aug 22 '05 at 3:01am

everyone should be able to continue voting as they see fit.

the threadless staff took into consideration how people vote, yeah, even the zeros.

payback by kicking people off because they have high standards for what they will or won't buy, or what makes a good design, is just juvenile.

complaining that people who don't have any submissions, or who've been on the site for a day or a week, give low scores or criticize your work? Welcome to the world. I've been designing for 15 years, don't have a sub up yet, and only been here a week or two. And if I see something I think is bad design or not good for a shirt, I'll give it a low score, and that's appropriate.

The rule is actually good, and even if your submission is voted on by 100 people who are addicted to this site only, and not your friends, at least it's voted on by people who have seen hundreds of designs and have a basis for scoring it. Not just for whether they like you.

And I'm not gonna say grow up, because I realize some of you are in junior high and can't be expected to know what the real world is like. This is just a taste. It ain't fair.

gerpander on Aug 22 '05 at 3:07am

Some wise man once said "Life is hard Beavis". And it is.

howlynart on Aug 22 '05 at 3:28am

Oh, and it's late, so I did sound like an ass describing myself as an artist since the disco days... Honestly my designs will surely suck and die. There are a lot of really talented artists here.

5 days later

HRTWRK on Aug 27 '05 at 8:08pm

Seems like most of the people complaining about the new process keep going back to "but I didn't even have time to promote my design/tell my friends about it/write and email/etc."

If a submission is good, the community will vote for it. If it's not, they won't... and no amount of promotional reinforcements is going to fix that.

Breaker3D on Aug 28 '05 at 3:10pm

Good idea. But the ideas are gonna have to be really poor to average 1.5 with 100 votes

Pinstripekiss on Aug 28 '05 at 3:56pm

Its the spiderman! no wait.. its the batman!~

Danelese on Aug 28 '05 at 6:44pm

word.

Robert_Huston on Aug 29 '05 at 6:07pm

Sounds like a great plan.

emsef on Aug 29 '05 at 7:15pm

Better late then never with respect to the 24 hour rule.

MrDomino on Aug 30 '05 at 12:20am

2.0 Rule. You know you want it.

Sitniz on Aug 30 '05 at 8:09am

Few... good thing I got in before the new ruling. :)

tesko on Aug 30 '05 at 8:11am

This is old news, it's changed again.

AaronRockwell on Aug 30 '05 at 6:58pm

harsh but very fair. just like george w. bush jr.

bangshedies on Aug 31 '05 at 11:20pm

Where, oh, where has my little dog gone?
Oh, where, oh, where could he be?

38 days later

jonlink on Oct 09 '05 at 9:59am

100 votes is a small sample, this is an idea with a heart in the right place but is misguided. at anyrate you should at least add a stat that says how long the design was in the running.

R to the Sizzle on Oct 09 '05 at 10:05am

You do realize that they have changed this policy, right?

tesko on Oct 09 '05 at 10:06am

OLD OLD OLD

it's changed, this needs to be deleted

WallsReallyWork on Oct 09 '05 at 11:34am

whats the new rule then, tesko

WallsReallyWork on Oct 09 '05 at 11:35am

o nm, i see now

78 days later

Paparazi on Dec 27 '05 at 5:22am

please let me know whether you guys receive my design or not? Please! Please!!

staffell on Dec 27 '05 at 5:32am

lol at that ^

57 days later

mandarin orange on Feb 22 '06 at 5:39pm

I submitted three shirt designs on Saturday and it is now Wednesday...were they already up for running and I somehow missed it? I didn't even get to see them up (or even know if they were up) and if they were taken down...

did this happen to them?

tesco on Feb 22 '06 at 5:40pm

This thread really needs to be deleted.

stingerstyler on Feb 22 '06 at 5:40pm

gerpander on Feb 22 '06 at 5:41pm

How do I submit?

staffell on Feb 22 '06 at 5:42pm

staffell, at 5:32am on Dec 27, 2005
lol at that ^

shimala on Feb 22 '06 at 5:42pm

I guess you missed the big bold text above the submit button... "Remember, it will take 4-7 days for us to approve your submission once you submit it. "

mandarin orange on Feb 22 '06 at 5:43pm

Oh, sorry.

staffell on Feb 22 '06 at 5:44pm

staffell, at 5:42pm on Feb 22, 2006
staffell, at 5:32am on Dec 27, 2005
lol at that ^

stingerstyler on Feb 22 '06 at 5:44pm

Amazing that you even reply to that. Three cheers for you!

littlem on Feb 22 '06 at 5:44pm

gerpander, at 5:41pm on Feb 22, 2006

How do I submit?
~~~~~~~~~~~~
you just roll over and expose your belly.

gerpander on Feb 22 '06 at 5:45pm

I thought mandarin's designs got printed and were sold out on monday, but maybe it's the damn time zone thing.

stingerstyler on Feb 22 '06 at 5:45pm

whoo-hooo-hooo!!

mandarin orange on Feb 22 '06 at 5:48pm

were they really? did anybody else see that?
oh no :(

staffell on Feb 22 '06 at 5:51pm

Yeah, gerps right thats what happened unfortunately, sorry about that :(

stingerstyler on Feb 22 '06 at 5:51pm

Didn't you buy like a dozen of those Staffell?

littlem on Feb 22 '06 at 5:52pm

yeah, shame she missed all the commotion

mandarin orange on Feb 22 '06 at 5:54pm

oh wait, sorry i misread that. i thought we was saying that it went up and people voted it under 1.5.

nevermind.
what an asshole.

staffell on Feb 22 '06 at 5:54pm

A bakers thereof to be correct sitinger

stingerstyler on Feb 22 '06 at 5:55pm

Sell them on Ebay and become a millionaire!

steve_swartz on Feb 22 '06 at 5:59pm

mandarin, it's not nice to call yourself names.

14 days later

okgo on Mar 08 '06 at 8:16pm

I have a comment...
Actually, It is more of a question.

Are you on CRACK? I have seen some of the designs that make it through the "judging process" and I have compared them to some of my design that have been turned away due to
"bad design". Some of the stuff you let through is not fit to wipe my ass with. Just thought I would let you know.

JOHN2 on Mar 08 '06 at 8:21pm

maybe yours are just 'bad' bad...as oppsed to 'funny' bad or 'so bad it's good' bad. There's a fine line there.

ziggystardust on Mar 08 '06 at 8:21pm

its like social darwinism for threadless!

gocryemokid on Mar 08 '06 at 8:22pm

someones a little egomanical.

okgo on Mar 08 '06 at 8:38pm

No, not all I am sure that some of the stuff I submitted is by no means the best design. I am just wondering who is driving the bus on this crazy trip. Do they even know where they are going? What exactly is the juding process?

okgo on Mar 08 '06 at 8:44pm

You know what, never mind. It is what it is and Threadless is still one of the best outlets for all artist to be involved with. Good luck to everybody and keep the design coming...

12 days later

Easily_Distracted on Mar 21 '06 at 11:23am

I was declined my first three submissions... that just bums a rookie out... and worst of all i don't even get an explanation of why... i have also seen really bad shirts posted which gets me thinking... I am that Bad?

spencekarl on Mar 21 '06 at 11:40am

why don't you post images of your submission as a blog entry and let the readers offer suggestions of possible explainations as to why they might have been declined. it's a start at least.

27 days later

heavenly_devil on Apr 17 '06 at 5:11pm

If a design is declined...is there any way of knowing why??? just so it can help us improve on what didnt work...

25 days later

Juicy Pop! on May 12 '06 at 7:56pm

well..
i think it's a good idea that this has been implemented ...even though my first sub got booted :(
but after reading some of peoples concerns i would have to agree that maybe it could be extended to a longer period of time... even 48 hours would be good.

3 days later

t-lex on May 16 '06 at 1:44pm

my submission averaged 1.59 and got dropped.
why?

staffell on May 16 '06 at 1:46pm

because the voters didnt like it enough

spencekarl on May 16 '06 at 1:46pm

click the link at the top for the update to this rule...what you're reading is the old rule.

eskimopunk on May 16 '06 at 1:52pm

coolio... hasn't this been done b4

benny breaks on May 16 '06 at 1:55pm

please take down my crappy pinche uno sub. it is a disgrace to my family name.

tomburns on May 16 '06 at 2:04pm

it's all about chuck darwin baby.

16 days later

pheakdey on Jun 01 '06 at 5:40pm

Why is my score something 690 and then 300 when I checked again. Is it because alot of people first voted 5$ then alot of people voted $0.

How can a design vary so much? A design with $5 from 75% of voters shouldn't be affected by people who vote $1 or $0.

.moto. on Jun 01 '06 at 5:43pm

25 days later

SwitchBlade on Jun 26 '06 at 6:52pm

This world needs an ENEMA!

109 days later

ozrict two on Oct 14 '06 at 11:17am

This rule doesn't take into account the possibility that somebody could have lots of friends on this site sabotaging somebody elses scores....i think the quality of your designs will suffer because of this...

22 days later

404 on Nov 06 '06 at 9:07am

what should I say : this is just unfair !

The point is that the average score and number of votes published are differt from those I saw last time I connected.

760 vote and an average score of 4.50

Thanks anyway

shimala on Nov 06 '06 at 9:25am

ozrict two - You would have to have a few hundred friends to even make a dent in someone's score. This rule has been in effect for almost two years and I haven't seen any designs suffering.

404 - I think you're confusing a few things here. Where are you getting those numbers above. I think you're looking at the number of designs you've scored and the average score you've gave out.

spencekarl on Nov 06 '06 at 9:34am

just a fun fact:

the average score of all printed shirts is 2.87
the average score of all printed shirts in 2006 is 2.81

steven218 on Nov 06 '06 at 9:45am

that screws most of my subs then!

steven218 on Nov 06 '06 at 9:45am

really, i don't see a problem with the rule

404 on Nov 08 '06 at 8:52am

shimala - the data I gave (760 vote and an average score of 4.50) was public at Euorpean time 23.30 on the 4th november 2006 on my banner link you provided. the point is I cannot prove that because you data is not public ! I didn t ever recive any email letting me know the gfx was dropped down (think you declare on the website).

66 days later

padrino on Jan 14 '07 at 2:50am

I agree with the rule, but we all know that it has more oportunities the one that post his tee between monday to friday... on weekend, less people checks whats new..... i think..

Roostersauce on Jan 14 '07 at 2:51am

....why are you bringing this back?

99 days later

Splitlip on Apr 23 '07 at 10:14pm

Sweet! So if me and my 99 best friends vote a 1 on all new designs except mine, then I'm sure to win.

45 days later

ashmith on Jun 08 '07 at 3:40pm

sweet now I can never win !

5 days later

jayforlove on Jun 14 '07 at 9:46am

okay,it's prety fair and nice, I'll be allright even drop my design

13strong on Jun 14 '07 at 9:57am

The Threadless boffins need to put their massive, brainy heads together and come up with a way to sort the problem of decent sub getting appalling scores. Too many people score a 0 simply because they wouldn't buy something, when they should be giving points for artistic merit, good concept, etc etc. Thus, you end up with far too many excellent designs receiving a -2.00 score, which is ridiculous.

Come on boffins!

barriebarrie on Jun 14 '07 at 10:06am

"In the slang of the United Kingdom, boffins are scientists, engineers, and other people who are stereotypically seen as engaged in technical or scientific research. The word conjures up images of older men in thick spectacles and white lab coats working with complicated chemical apparatus. " - in case anyone else was wondering

That aside, this site exists to sell shirts or at least supports itself by selling shirts which makes it not at all unreasonable to score the designs based on whether or not you would pay $17 for it hence the handy little "I'd buy it" box to check at the top of the scoring column.

It might be nice if everything in life were judged solely on artistic merit. Might be.

13strong on Jun 14 '07 at 10:16am

Exactly - the indication of whether or not you would buy the shirt is provided for with the "I'd Buy It" button. Which means that the other 5 buttons should be used for rating the merits of the design. But this is obviously not happening, and the result is that good designs get extremely low scores, undeservingly.

The whole point of the 1-5 marking system should be that, even if you do not want to own the shirt yourself, you can recognise that a design is good enough that other people might want to.

Also, it's a real slap in the face to a talented designer when they get a less-than-2.0 score for something they put a lot of work into.

barriebarrie on Jun 14 '07 at 10:27am

You don't think we plebian non-artists take that into account?

barriebarrie aka barrie is a 32.47 year old girl, has been a member since May 21, 2007, has scored 1591 submissions, giving an average score of 2.70.

13strong aka Graeme McGregor is a 24.97 year old boy, has been a member since March 26, 2007, has scored 684 submissions, giving an average score of 2.74.

That means that both of us have given scores of less than 2 in order to achieve those averages. I've given 186 scores of 1 and 13 zeros. What designs are you seeing that you feel are excellent but are receiving such low scores? I personally take the scoring process very seriously and try to offer suggestions if I see a design that I think would be marketable if only x, y or z.

59 days later

Ted Umptious on Aug 13 '07 at 6:37am

As a victim of the new scoring system I still think it's fair. I'm a relative newbie (see I've got no profile pic) I did resister a while back but fell to the wayside for a while.

No system will ever be perfect but it has to be survival of the fitest as long as it doesn't become elitist. If people start feeling there designs will never achieve an above 1.5 average they'll stop submitting and they'll also stop buying. Thus cutting out the slack with the double edged sword of cutting out customers.

Threadless I'm sure are aware of this. But if the rule is changed again I'd imagine it'll have more to do with economics than anything else. Perhaps it should be like golf with a hanicapping system? I'm not sure how it works as I don't play the game but it works in golf!

34 days later

RollieParker on Sep 16 '07 at 1:47pm

i think that there should be a longer time period, at least 2 days.

10 days later

godmaster79 on Sep 27 '07 at 1:39am

I'm not a scarecrow!

118 days later

exoartificial on Jan 23 '08 at 12:46am

That's cool

2 days later

bemfi on Jan 25 '08 at 1:43am

i hope i got email from you:)

Taurien on Jan 25 '08 at 3:59am

I totally agree with the new rule

16 days later

BB_freshII on Feb 10 '08 at 6:36am

I totally NOT understand why u dropped mine because the note is 1.65 and not less than 1.5 !!

2 days later

alvinworkshop on Feb 12 '08 at 6:54am

WOW~wat a new rule.
but i like it huh~

squatterjohn on Feb 12 '08 at 7:00am

This rule is so old. It's been changed:

1. Every design will have at least 24 hours to be scored. We are no longer using 100 votes as the qualification for removal.
2. We are no longer using an average score of 1.5 as the minimum score to stay in the running. We will now be using an arbitrary score that is made up of multiple variables including the number of I'd buy it requests and the design's average score. These exact scores will not be made public.

That is why your design was dropped.

7 days later

dlene on Feb 19 '08 at 8:09pm

and so? what will happen to my design? 24 hours is not enough to judge our design..anyway goodluck to everyone..hope this rules apply to everyone, i mean do fair..thanks

7 days later

staffell on Feb 27 '08 at 7:11am

read the fucking blogs

38 days later

asona on Apr 06 '08 at 3:58am

so sad!!!!.. but i will try again... rejections is good !!

10 days later

Mukkinese on Apr 16 '08 at 7:52am

Clearly this rule is more about generating sales than separating the wheat from the chaff. There is nothing wrong with that, but I would prefer if the site were honest about it.

Restrictions like this force the designers to compete as salesmen for their designs and the best sales person, all other things being equal, will be the one whose designs get through most often. The stated reasons for this rule obviously do not stand up to scrutiny, there are many sites, Devientart for instance, which sell printed goods, but allow a permanent gallery of images. If Threadless really wanted to make rating easier rather than motivate designers to sell, they would simply split the designs into categories which could be browsed according to the interests of those doing the rating.

24 hours to live or die is great for the company, but not so much for creativity, like everything else in life, you have to search through lots of dross to find the occasional gem and merely dumping everything which does not generate immediate attention is not going to help new designers with new ideas.

Having said that, Threadless did not promise to help produce our designs, they merely offer us the opportunity to compete to get them published and it is up to us to take it or leave it. Not being much of a salesman I have to accept that such sites as this are not for me.

squatterjohn on Apr 17 '08 at 12:51pm

This is a message for the next person trying to post in this blog:

DON'T!

This rule is old. It's been replaced by another. But don't dare post in that blog either.

Your design was dropped because it wasn't good enough. Threadless is a contest. Take the advice you got in your comments and use it to make something better. Don't piss and moan here.

platok9 on Apr 18 '08 at 1:42pm

squatterjohn sounds like hes got a lil bit of a stick up his butt

Torakamikaze on Apr 18 '08 at 1:45pm

squatterjohn sounds like he~~s got a lil bit of a stick up his butt~~ knows what he's talking about

keithcw on Apr 18 '08 at 1:51pm

I'm typing on the Internet!

DaniellesGarden on Apr 18 '08 at 1:57pm

keithcw on Apr 18 '08 at 1:51pm
I'm typing on the Internet!

FRICKINAWESOME on Apr 18 '08 at 2:34pm

So my last collab got a score.00000000000000001 and it was so fucking awesome! How DARE it be dropped after five votes??? No one understands my true brilliance...NO ONE!!!

tracerbullet on Apr 18 '08 at 2:49pm

be quiet, evan. i'm tired if you subbing designs with pictures of poo on them. it's not creative and they deserve to get kicked out early. ugh.

Torakamikaze on Apr 18 '08 at 2:51pm

i put baked beans in can spill on shirt, but now get .6 for as scoring? threadless should try for making wins to those for their baked beans cause of all money that will be making!

FRICKINAWESOME on Apr 18 '08 at 2:53pm

Damn you Brian!!! But it was a picture of a piece of poo pooping out a piece of poo! do you not see the levels of shit I am trying to create here?

tracerbullet on Apr 18 '08 at 2:55pm

your scattalogical humor is lost on the intellectual masses. i suggest you try to refine your skills into something that doesn't quite resemble utter garbage. perhaps an edible item with a face?

FRICKINAWESOME on Apr 18 '08 at 2:58pm

I'LL DO IT BRIAN!!!

I might wanna save that baby for the next Revolution contest tho.

2 days later

platok9 on Apr 21 '08 at 11:41am

believe it or not there are ways to know what youre talking about and not be a dick about it. dick.

arent people supposed to be nice on here?

everyone on here is just full of themself and money hungry.

its really sad.

Torakamikaze on Apr 21 '08 at 11:48am

was i just called a dick?

i think some people need to not take things so seriously, so that they realize that people are indeed nice on here.

everyone on here is just full of themself and money hungry.

its really sad.

???

tracerbullet on Apr 21 '08 at 11:56am

trust me, i don't eat money. i pay off student loans with it.

i mean, sure, i've been known to sprinkle a few dimes and pennies on a salad now and then, but that's it.

Torakamikaze on Apr 21 '08 at 11:58am

i miss the tropical fruity taste of $2 bills

tracerbullet on Apr 21 '08 at 12:00pm

have you tried the new buffalo nickels?

they are DEE-VIIIIIINE

Torakamikaze on Apr 21 '08 at 12:03pm

i likea my nickles spicy!

tracerbullet on Apr 21 '08 at 12:04pm

i tried some canadian money once, but it all tasted like maple syrup

Torakamikaze on Apr 21 '08 at 12:06pm

yeah... i tried some canadian money once... i was totally expecting it to taste like bacon, but instead it tasted like ham.

37 days later