Culture For The Non-Cultured

OK, so everyone knows Wikipedia, the uber-popular, surprisingly accurate online encyclopedia that everyone around the world can edit and contribute to, right?

It turns out the collective wisdom of the masses is also …

Designing really cool t-shirts!!

This magic happens at Threadless, which holds contests for the best-designed t-shirt. Designers design. Everyone votes. The winning designers get a small cash prize. Anyone can buy any of the t-shirts for around $12-$15.

And Threadless is thriving, according to Inc. Magazine, where I found out about it. It’s 8 years old. It’s projected to make $5 million this year. Venture capitalists are knocking on the founders’ doors.

But the company is about more than money.  It’s a true democracy. It’s better than regular democracies, really, because voting happens constantly and nothing is done without input from the site’s community.

And communication is never-ending and wide-spread: The designers talk to each other and to customers on the online forums.  All the employees — from the CEOs on down — interact with the community tirelessly, both online and even at company headquarters, where Threadless devotees hang out for hours at a time.

Threadless is also about talented artists slaving away, not for the nominal cash awards they receive if they win, but for the chance to do something they love and get their name out there. The company kind of removes the corporate ladder with all its steepness and slipperiness and makes it easier for talented designers to reach greater heights.

While reading about Threadless, I was reminded of a quote from Suze Rotolo, who was Bob Dylan’s girlfriend and guru in the 1960’s.  In a feature article in the New York Times, she said the following about the ever-present nostalgia for the artist communities of the ’60’s, “Everything occurs again, just differently,” she said. “There will always be creative people who feel that they’re different and create a community of some kind. Whether it’s a physical neighborhood or an Internet neighborhood, in Bushwick or in Greenwich Village, it’s not over.”

And that’s what Threadless is: an Internet, T-shirt making neighborhood.

And here are just a few of the neighborhood T-shirts.