If this sells out you people have a lot of explaining to do.

palookaboy wrote:OMGAWWWWL then don't vote for it! Also, you're obviously jealous of his success.

There, now that that's out of the way, nobody else has to say it.

Well put, Kyle.

What really bothers me about this is that it hasn't been rejectionatored despite explicit examples that similar shirts exist. Shirts are knocked out for this on a regular basis. Ramy's cliche entries? Nope.

This is really the crux of the insult.

There is plenty that can be said about why pure democracies don't work. Every time someone casts a vote that is uneducated and makes a huge difference, even if that vote is for something positive, it proves where it is broken. This is true of all things. And in the world of shirts THIS COMPETITION IS A HUGE ISSUE. There is only one major site that has remotely similar sales and a larger base payout. There is $1000 on the line. If you make $1000 during a single work week, you have a right to laugh at how important that is. No one else does. This is a big deal for the mostly amateur designers who enter here. Ramy is amateur in his overall oeuvre, not just his professional artistic standing, but most of the most popular users here are not professional artists either, and those who ARE pro are regularly engaged in totally different artistic pursuits, where you wouldn't ever know the shirt art from the "pro" art. And when this is a big deal, you should be voting with that deal in mind. There is a lot that needs to go into a print, and quality should ALWAYS be tantamount. You can analyze quality without liking something... I don't think I own any of the shirts I've believed to be the absolute best done here. I own many great ones, but the truly great pieces that printed are not always my taste. And yet, I have cheered those pieces, because they are of an undeniable merit. This only has "popularity". So does the Biebs. He is not a musician any more than Ramy is an artist. If in 2010, a poll of influential musicians had come out and people had voted bieber #1, over the Beatles, let's say, or Michael Jackson, or Nirvana, or anyone of similar stature for song quality and relevance, they would never have published it, or would have mocked the choice and the people who chose it. People are faulty, and some honors should not be bestowed by the masses alone. Especially when there is money involved. Especially when the recipient has strong ties to frauds involving fake internet handles and falsified names increasing exposure in real life as well. These are facts.

But even if we pretend that democracy ISNT broken by necessity, and that woot doesn't prove it in these situations, there is the BASIC inequality. This has similar shirts exist. Many of them. And is not rejected. And yet great designs are rejected for slightly imperfect shades of the tee in the mock-up. There are strong, well-spoken and well-evidenced opinions that can be offered as to why his work is inferior, which are only ever countered with "UR JELLIS I LIKE THIS SO I VOTE JUST DONT VOTE BECUZ I DONT UNDERSTAND WHY VOTES MEAN SOMETHING QQ WHATEVER THAT MEANS." But at the end of the day, what happens to him more than anyone is that a design will exist which is CLEARLY in violation of BASIC rules anyone else would get the axe for, and yet no one dodges these basic bullets more than he does. And no one at woot has the cojones to respond to it. There needs to be a dialog if woot is going to make these choices out of nowhere. It needs to be continually open so we know all of what they are thinking, and know they are listening to our responses and responding back. There cannot be such huge discrepancies of enforcement of rules that have so little room for interpretation. And that should be an offense anyone can understand. If they do not, they have no right to argue, because that is no longer opinion. There are facts here. And those facts are being ignored when things like this are ignored.