Threadless T-Shirts - Changes to the 1.5 rule

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Aug 25 '05 by Threadless

545 Comments

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Changes to the 1.5 rule

We've made some changes today to the 1.5 rule. (What's the 1.5 rule?) There are 2 main points to note:

Every design will have at least 24 hours to be scored. We are no longer using 100 votes as the qualification for removal.
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.

If your design is removed from the running, you will receive an email notification as to why it was removed.

We hope this makes things a bit more fair!

Skipper6745 on Aug 25 '05 at 3:20pm

Hooray!!

bortwein on Aug 25 '05 at 3:20pm

Oh Snap!

sarahrae on Aug 25 '05 at 3:21pm

Thats a great thing! Thanks for listening to all the feedback that came off of the 1.5 rule.

Knowing that you listen is always appreciated.

But what about designs that have been killed off in the last week or so from the 1.5 rule. By any chance would we be able to resubmit them 1 time only?

tesko on Aug 25 '05 at 3:23pm

Thats great news, good call.

lenabean on Aug 25 '05 at 3:24pm

thanks threadless team!

Perudoesitbetterthanu on Aug 25 '05 at 3:25pm

hmm...i suppose...

kypade on Aug 25 '05 at 3:25pm

doubt an ''arbitrary'' score made up of ''variables'' is gonna go over too well...especially if it causes 1.6s or so to drop. but, hey...sounds good enough to me.

Luke... on Aug 25 '05 at 3:26pm

sounds good "threadless"....
you've appeased the masses with #1
and also upgraded the qualification process for yourselves and all with #2...
thats good business...

Leslee on Aug 25 '05 at 3:26pm

It just gets better and better.

KatieTheMofo on Aug 25 '05 at 3:26pm

Cool.
I like arbitrary rules.

bortwein on Aug 25 '05 at 3:44pm

This does kind of make me even more nervous about being filtered out, but I can't figure out why yet.

littlem on Aug 25 '05 at 3:48pm

hmmm. very interesting.

Kamiblue on Aug 25 '05 at 3:51pm

Does this mean that we can resubmit designs that dropped out under the old 1.5 rule?

thatsnotnormal on Aug 25 '05 at 3:52pm

That's cool. :)
Thanks, Threadless.

Operator on Aug 25 '05 at 4:00pm

Thank you. Seriously.

shimala on Aug 25 '05 at 4:21pm

no, you can't resubmit designs that were already submitted and dropped

Robsoul on Aug 25 '05 at 4:26pm

mathematics my dear watson, mathematics

there were only some occassions where the 1.5 rule work against us, but it did serve a good purpose.

MoniqueH on Aug 25 '05 at 4:26pm

Oh, great. This means crappy designs will be around longer.

travis76 on Aug 25 '05 at 4:29pm

yes, math, more people means you need to expand the voting system as well.
great idea. thanks for listening, if you did.

Kamiblue on Aug 25 '05 at 4:30pm

Too bad we cant resub I think my Five Card Stud design deserved better-must've been the text

mrwalrusface on Aug 25 '05 at 4:48pm

good correction

themidtownkoala on Aug 25 '05 at 4:52pm

While I tend to agree with MoniqueH in general, I am excited to increase my number of submissions scored. Go 15000!

tripmachine on Aug 25 '05 at 4:53pm

Thats good

moodyfaye on Aug 25 '05 at 5:51pm

"Thanks for listening to all the feedback "

sharpie on Aug 25 '05 at 8:00pm

that sounds cool.

Ava Adore on Aug 25 '05 at 9:02pm

yeah thats a better scoring system.

fatclike on Aug 25 '05 at 9:36pm

People who can't take competition might as well quit. If a design is recieving a low score early on, it's probably going to stay that way. I like most of the shirts they decide to print, but who seriously has time to thumb through all the crappy submittions. I say the more they weed out, the better! (even if it's mine)

MrDomino on Aug 25 '05 at 11:10pm

With a very few exceptions I have really no problems with the original 1.5 rule. I think you could even go to a 2.0 rule. Would some of mine be dropped? Sure, but when they do I know to try harder.

I think there should be exceptions of course, but that could be left to Threadless staff.

stuck with pins on Aug 25 '05 at 11:12pm

Yes!
Finally!

<3

Webbins on Aug 26 '05 at 2:56am

Sounds a bit too mathematical to me, but if it cuts out the crap then it's all good.

caro.d on Aug 26 '05 at 3:07am

24 hours is great !

Iwouldbejosh on Aug 26 '05 at 3:21am

This sounds way better than before

bigshape on Aug 26 '05 at 3:56am

this fills me with dread/glee or something.

travis76 on Aug 26 '05 at 7:18am

sigh...too late for homo superius...

but make the monkey tag 'threadless' and maybe i'll resubmit

biggdesign on Aug 26 '05 at 7:36am

oh dang~

Pifman on Aug 26 '05 at 3:03pm

Well I *think* this is a good idea.

3 days later

tesko on Aug 30 '05 at 8:13am

This is the new shizzle, ignore that other one

Sitniz on Aug 30 '05 at 8:39am

Alright, good deal :)

7 days later

Peachcupcake on Sep 06 '05 at 9:11pm

sounds a lot better :)

142 days later

simster214 on Jan 27 '06 at 3:17pm

These exact scores will not be made public.

^^Aw. Why?!

OlliRudi on Jan 27 '06 at 3:28pm

they're a bit too secretive here at threadless, it'd be nice to see how many "i'd buy it"s designs scored..

simster214 on Jan 27 '06 at 3:46pm

^^I know olli! I'd love to see it, even if it was just for my own designs.

gimetzco on Jan 27 '06 at 4:13pm

#1. my designs have been removes after first day, and not once have i been notified about why...(i have had one rejected, but that wasn't the same situation)

#2. if you pick from the top scores, but not the top of the top scores...how is it that there are many shirts that you have printed that are low scores...just go through the catalog and you'll find some that aren't 1.5 even...

gimetzco on Jan 27 '06 at 4:20pm

(sp)removed

100 days later

w4nderl4nd on May 07 '06 at 6:08pm

Why do the exact scores will not be made public???

adam antium on May 07 '06 at 6:09pm

i'll never get printed!
:P

50 days later

kaloyster on Jun 26 '06 at 8:31pm

I've noticed some designs (very great too! ex. ste7en's) and it has a This design has ended early thing. And it's almost near to end scoring. Why is that?

hogboy on Jun 26 '06 at 8:48pm

great

Ste7en on Jun 26 '06 at 9:00pm

yeah I just wrote them about those two...I dont get it...I also cant believe they got identical scores

Papaprime on Jun 26 '06 at 9:09pm

I wonder why it noted mine was dropped early, scored a 2.26 and lasted all 7 days. The notation that it was dropped early popped up this evening...?

steve_swartz on Jun 26 '06 at 9:12pm

i think they have some bugs in the code that drops things. it's changed with the new site, as compared to what they're talking about here. have you sent email via the support alias to threadless central? or created a bug report blog with "SKAW" in the title or something?

kooky love on Jun 26 '06 at 9:22pm

two thumbs up!
good!

Papaprime on Jun 26 '06 at 11:40pm

sartz, npoe. I've never done a bug report, I'll look into it. Thanks.

Ste7en on Jun 27 '06 at 9:51am

looks like they fixed it this morning...or maybe it disappears after a day if its an error

spencekarl on Jun 27 '06 at 10:00am

it's still not fixed...there are some subs that clearly went through seven days that it says were dropped early.

here's one i just noticed.

steven218 on Jun 27 '06 at 10:02am

i just got my worst score ever. fuckers.

spencekarl on Jun 27 '06 at 10:05am

i was surprised it got dumped out early. sorry man.

Ste7en on Jun 27 '06 at 10:05am

Im pretty sure it just shows up the day it finishes scoring and goes away the next day when it says "finished scoring one day ago" but I hope it doesnt affect anything

Garnett F on Jun 27 '06 at 10:12am

This sounds good.

As Threadless has ultimate discretion over what gets printed or not, it is pointless campaigning for a change in the scoring system.

At the risk of suggesting what is already contained in the "arbitrary score that is made up of multiple variables including the number of I'd buy it requests and the design's average score" I'd go one step or two steps further:

As I've said, Threadless has ultimate discretion, so why not give more weight to those scorers whose scores most closely mirror Threadless's dicisions to print?

shimala on Jun 27 '06 at 10:21am

things should be fixed now... nothing was affected

spencekarl on Jun 27 '06 at 10:22am

excellent. thanks for the quick response shimala!

spires on Jun 27 '06 at 8:01pm

I just suffered my first threadless death! Huzzah!

That's what I get for putting a borg on a shirt.

elscorchogal on Jun 27 '06 at 8:05pm

i am very pleased to hear this...

spires on Jun 27 '06 at 8:07pm

hear about the rule, or my death? Both are fascinating, I admit.

Angelic on Jun 27 '06 at 10:13pm

Injustice to all the great designers out there!! Why change the 1.5 rule NOW??? Darn! BTW, why can't you make the scores public? Is this a conspiracy or what? : (

India on Jun 27 '06 at 10:20pm

im still wondering what the rules/guidlines/scoring information is on the slogans

chisafer on Jun 27 '06 at 10:25pm

...but... but... but is it still called the 1.5 rule?

shimala on Jun 27 '06 at 10:30pm

nothing has been changed with the rule since this post was originally made last August.

The only addition is that it actual says on your submission that it has been dropped.

shimala on Jun 27 '06 at 10:32pm

...for the first day at least

slogans are deleted if it has less than a 10% approval rating after 20 or so scores. We're working on a section that will list your deleted slogans instead of vanishing into space.

India on Jun 27 '06 at 10:45pm

how long and how many votes do they need to hit before they are compleated in scoring?

do you guys know of a percentage yet that has a chance of being printed?

haha sorry for asking so much, im just curious

stupidostrich on Jun 27 '06 at 10:45pm

Hey, maybe I should have just rasterized some photos that would violate all sorts of copyrights.. then my design wouldn't have been dropped by you shitfucks.

hogboy on Jun 27 '06 at 10:51pm

I think you mean vectored or vectorised... if your photos are on the computer they are in a raster format

India on Jun 27 '06 at 10:58pm

stupidostrich needs a reality check. if threadless is so worthless to him, he shouldnt be on here, haha

parabolic on Jun 27 '06 at 11:22pm

"We're working on a section that will list your deleted slogans instead of vanishing into space."

Does this included self-deleted slogans? I signed in one day and was surprised to find some bad text I'd deleted had been resurrected.

Thanks!

teechers_pet on Jun 28 '06 at 10:02am

Sweeeeeeeeet

fireant202 on Jun 29 '06 at 5:59pm

damn, I was having trouble already.

stingerstyler on Jun 29 '06 at 6:01pm

cha-ching

this blog is almost a year old!!!

Mangobee on Jun 30 '06 at 8:30pm

are we all happy this shirt got dropped or wat r we all cheering about

.Li. on Jul 01 '06 at 1:56pm

i honestly dont see whats wrong with the shirt

tesco on Jul 01 '06 at 1:57pm

pwnd

now this is linked to the submission pages, it has become the blog of the pwnee.

WinterInChicago on Jul 01 '06 at 7:26pm

My second submission. My first acceptance. My first drop. I am more of a dvd/cd designer. Maybe I will submit another shirt later on.

6 days later

myKey on Jul 08 '06 at 11:21am

A chance to chance another chance again.

4 days later

mikaelb on Jul 12 '06 at 7:49pm

Well, okey for me. My tee only got 1.44 in score anyhow ;)
Good change, anyhow.

6 days later

penta on Jul 19 '06 at 12:48pm

24 hours is too short. Much as I love your site I don't want to have to hit it every day... (and no, I don't have a shirt in the running...)

5115 on Jul 19 '06 at 12:49pm

Why is this bumped atleast once a week?! >;(

spencekarl on Jul 19 '06 at 12:51pm

penta, i think you're confused. the designs still go through 7 days of voting. the first 24 hours determine whether the deisgn is worthy enough to continue on for the rest of the week.

2 days later

Koffy_Kat on Jul 22 '06 at 12:16pm

I was very disappointed that my design was pulled on a Sat after only being up 24 hours I hardly had a chance to promote it. Waaa!!

I guess I better just back on the horse.

nobeef on Jul 22 '06 at 6:06pm

Lame!

4 days later

gautam on Jul 27 '06 at 1:32am

Great!!!! Cos my design was dropped!!! I love the system!!!

plankton on Jul 28 '06 at 9:10pm

ouch... my eye!!

5 days later

mrfaux on Aug 03 '06 at 2:41pm

Could we get some transparency in this process? I wanna know about these variable and how they work. Otherwise, how do I know my votes really count?

mezo on Aug 03 '06 at 2:48pm

Don't you wish the 1.5 rule could apply to the Rate My Butt scores?

4this on Aug 03 '06 at 3:26pm

? What's your highest butt score?

12 days later

thisisthebreakdown on Aug 15 '06 at 5:26pm

i suck as a designer...

Jesus Te Ama on Aug 15 '06 at 5:52pm

I don't know because my design was dropped!

thisisthebreakdown on Aug 15 '06 at 5:53pm

i wanna protest

GIVE DESIGNS A CHANCE!

5 days later

kirksheltonart on Aug 20 '06 at 6:09pm

seems like threadless is getting less and less dependent on people voting and more about what they want to print or not.

mighty mouse on Aug 21 '06 at 1:34pm

i think it such cause not everyone gets on the days you post new ones i think it should be 48 hours so that leaves it open for people that dont get on everyday

shadowboy on Aug 21 '06 at 1:40pm

Kirk hits the bullseye.

Isn't that pretty much common knowledge by now?

Siafu on Aug 22 '06 at 2:34pm

Not bad for first try, is it?

GadFlie on Aug 22 '06 at 2:37pm

If you go back and look at the shirts from long ago history, you can see that some of the shirts they printed got high votes and some got not so high votes. Even three years ago, when all the votes were higher. So I don't think threadless is getting less and less dependent on votes. I don't think they ever were.

etwod on Aug 22 '06 at 2:56pm

it may be for jsut a public opinion. They also get ppl to say wheter or not they would buy it, and send them a notice if/when it prints.

curlysuperlative on Aug 23 '06 at 3:38pm

^^Amen to the comment [mightymouse] left.

Bulka on Aug 24 '06 at 10:20am

Got one removed... YOOOHOOO, at last.

mighty mouse on Aug 24 '06 at 3:41pm

ill never get a chance if you dont change this shit

mezo on Aug 24 '06 at 3:49pm

Whining is for babies.
You would also think spitting up breast milk is for babies, but many adults do it.

spires on Aug 24 '06 at 3:51pm

mezo gets to be mean on her birthday, so SHADDAP

Ford Prefect on Aug 25 '06 at 1:01pm

what a gay rule

spencekarl on Aug 25 '06 at 1:02pm

makes sense to me

5 days later

Lebostudios on Aug 30 '06 at 4:52pm

i have not received the email. still working that kink out?

shimala on Aug 30 '06 at 4:57pm

The emails are being sent. It's probably being blocked by a spam blocker or something.

The email basically says what is posted at the top of this blog.

staffell on Aug 30 '06 at 5:00pm

haha

17 days later

Fuubeau123 on Sep 16 '06 at 5:18pm

i dont understand, but it doesnt matter because i wont be sumitting any design. heh heh!

3 days later

nanapolla on Sep 20 '06 at 7:42am

ouh...i take...1.49...sigh...

7 days later

Lumpaduppa on Sep 27 '06 at 11:13am

fiuuu.....OK! :)

ecky_ducky on Sep 27 '06 at 11:19am

Oh stop complaining, you lot. It's a good rule.

whendel on Sep 28 '06 at 4:43pm

Cool.
I like arbitrary rules.

3 days later

Djarum on Oct 02 '06 at 1:50pm

Thank You!

Bruce Coo on Oct 04 '06 at 12:02am

that sounds awesome but is there anyway we could remove our stuff before judge aproval sorta like deleting the slogans.. sometimes i feel like i wanna fix what i did a day later but i cant because its still pending.

jimjimdesign on Oct 05 '06 at 12:08pm

What?
I love to be dropped out of contest!
It makes me feel like an over-achiever!

Saladbowl on Oct 05 '06 at 6:58pm

That sucks...I was kicked out of the LAST KISS contest with NO NOTIFICATION AS TO WHY. I think for somebody new to this whole design idea this makes it really hard to get things going.

But I dont suppose my disliking this decision will change anything now. Anyhow, had to express it.

ash4182 on Oct 06 '06 at 4:44am

if people dont rate it high enough there is probobly a reason
some things just shouldnt be ona t-shirt- such as crashing planes and razors that look represent cutting oneself and being happy as a result
come on-

3 days later

pandasoniq on Oct 09 '06 at 12:38pm

Yeah I think the rule is crap too...sorry but being dropped without any explaination is not a good way to progress cause you can't learn from your mistakes if you don't know them...

I just don't like being out of the contest not knowing why...it's just very frustrating...

pandasoniq on Oct 09 '06 at 12:41pm

And I also didn't receive any E-mail at all...

3 days later

xdoom on Oct 12 '06 at 6:46pm

Man, it sucks when your design is a 1.65 and kicked out when others lower stayed.

thomasucks on Oct 13 '06 at 11:36am

o k .

ozrict two on Oct 14 '06 at 11:12am

sounds like its a popularity contest...i dont know if i'm going to bother with you anymore. i'm extremely disappointed.

staffell on Oct 14 '06 at 11:15am

haha, you people are mostly idiots

ozrict two on Oct 14 '06 at 11:41am

...well it seems like you changed the rules on me...it is a popularity contest after all....i find out today that my design is taken off the running because of a low score...too early...if my design was so bad how come no one has any bad coments about it? Why isnt anybody helping me to improve it? i put in a lot of effort into this work...i dont feel it was given its proper chance to score well...this is worse than communism...i dont have a million friends...just a few really good ones.

ozrict two on Oct 14 '06 at 11:47am

OK so i've said more than my two cents...deep breath and try again...maybe my design was really that bad, eh?
maybe it's just not your style...

i'm not emo, but i sure feel emo right now.

xuria on Oct 14 '06 at 12:20pm

I think the 24 hours length time should be extended, i think.... aaaargh....nevermind.... i just had my 1st death today... 1st submission 1st dropout... cute

Roostersauce on Oct 14 '06 at 12:24pm

ozrict man dont take it so hard
alot of ppl that have been printed have had their designs taken out early
it happens
its your first design keep subbing

4 days later

ozrict two on Oct 18 '06 at 3:53pm

MAMA DIDN'T DIDN'T RAISE NO QUITTER!!!!

eighten on Oct 18 '06 at 10:39pm

hahaha ^ozrict_two: "this is worse than communism"
you're right, ozrict_two, it's democracy!

8 days later

lambertini on Oct 27 '06 at 3:54am

well thats another day wasted doing that design. maybe i could use it for toilet paper or something useful.

MUST TRY HARDER!

psshaw on Oct 27 '06 at 7:14pm

I, too, was very surprised at my deleted design. I thought I knew what the Threadless voter liked! It'd be helpful to at least have recieved some comments about how I could have improved it.

chisafer on Oct 27 '06 at 7:19pm

wtf!!! when did this happen?!

;)

gordond on Oct 27 '06 at 7:22pm

august 25, 2005.

gordond on Oct 27 '06 at 7:23pm

oh yeah.

11 days later

kalien on Nov 08 '06 at 7:46am

Um my designs have been dropped but I have never received an email as to why.

7 days later

Rosh on Nov 15 '06 at 3:24pm

i had so many votes for a T and even some good comment.. i was kicked out so fast- cant understand why if the rules were changes... rats :(

digget on Nov 15 '06 at 7:35pm

Ok then

alienbiru on Nov 16 '06 at 1:03am

This is going to be hard.. but keep up fighting!!

6 days later

I lopez you on Nov 22 '06 at 5:38pm

okidoki

2 days later

novodoce on Nov 25 '06 at 1:56am

Back to the pixel board.

Malcolm Man on Nov 25 '06 at 2:06am

Sweet mustache of antonio banderas!

chisafer on Nov 25 '06 at 2:08am

OMG!!! YOU CAN NOT CHANGE THIS RULE!

I LIVE OFF OF THIS RULE! I guess,

I guess... I guess I will just have to stop living.

3 days later

grejotte on Nov 28 '06 at 12:36pm

I still don't understand why i was kicked out this fast... this rule changed on August 25, 2005 right?

wullagaru on Nov 28 '06 at 12:39pm

your sub stays up for 24 hours after that if it doesnt meet a certain criteria which they know but we dont(score , number of "id buy its" etc) tehn it gets dropped ..

grejotte on Nov 28 '06 at 4:55pm

Oh okay...

5 days later

Cib on Dec 04 '06 at 12:16pm

OK !

5 days later

Tommy Rocketboots on Dec 10 '06 at 8:35am

Eee! Second submission, first acceptance, LAST DROP!

I'm in it to win it.

Moey on Dec 11 '06 at 7:59pm

COOL

nicoz on Dec 13 '06 at 4:04am

:-((((((((((((((((((((((((((((((((
my FIRST sumbission it's been dropOut after 24hours.
:-((((((((((((((((((((((((((((((((((((((((

Margain on Dec 13 '06 at 3:45pm

NOOO PLASEE CHANGE THE RULE! Let atleast 3 days! It's hard to get people to sign up and support you in just 24hrs. I agree with the scoring minimum and total votes, but we need more days for supporters to vote! I hope my message reaches out to someone with decision power at threadless.com

nicoz on Dec 14 '06 at 5:08am

i agree with MARGAIN...24hours is not enough...
:-((((((((((((((((((((((((((((((