ramyb wrote:I've seen this type of comment before, but I've never really understood it- There are two possibilities with any given entry: the first is that people will like it, in which case it will get votes. The other is that people will not like it, and it won't. I can design whatever is fun or interesting to me, and then the voters can decide if they like it or not. If it doesn't do well, I'm not sure why anyone would be insulted- I would simply not be rewarded for my time. If it does do well, then clearly people enjoyed the design and so I'm not sure why they would feel insulted.
I assume that your question was supposed to be a sort of passive aggressive rhetorical one that implies that people SHOULD be insulted for some reason, but I will play dumb and answer anyway: no, I don't worry about it. Some designs will strike a chord with people, others won't. Contrary to popular belief, I do a lot of different types of designs (just look at the reckoning if you don't believe me)- I don't worry about how people will react to my designs anymore. I've dealt with enough garbage over the years on woot and have developed tough skin. If this design isn't your cup of tea, maybe the next one will be. If none of my designs are your cup of tea, then it's a good thing that there are hundreds of other designs that print each year.
Personally, I think it's wonderful. It makes a lot of references, but because it's done in silhouette it becomes a smart shirt. You have to genuinely know the different alien characters in order to get the reference. (I love the fact that Kang or Kodos from the Simpsons is on there!) Plus, it is a design that can withstand the test of "Not having the Derby title on the shirt". So many of the shirts in these letter derbies are basically people throwing together a bunch of disparate things that all start with the same letter. Yes, "Alligators arranging apples in Arizona" has clever assonance in the title, but it doesn't mean anything. And it certainly doesn't stand the test of someone coming up to you and asking what the shirt means. "Uh, yeah...There's this site called Woot and they have these things called Derbies and this was from the 'A' derby...So everything on the shirt starts with an 'A.'" With this shirt, on the other hand, you can say with, "It's like ET, but they're flying past a whole bunch of other aliens along the way."
Don't let naysayers get you down, ramyb. This is a quality shirt, well designed and clever, and it's just the kind of shirt I usually buy on Woot. And if it ever gets up into the fog, I'm taking back every other one of my fog votes to make sure it gets made. Keep up the good work!
