PosterBored - Basically, it's Threadless, but for posters

[posterbored]

Poster Bored - an open to anyone poster design contest! vote, design and buy anytime!

PosterBored is a site that myself and my girlfriend created because we were moving into a new apartment together, wanted some stuff for our walls, and we didn't care at all for any of the stuff on the big poster sites.

Basically, you can think of it as a Threadless, but for posters.

This is a user generated content site where artists come and submit poster designs, the user community votes and comments on them to choose the winners, and we take the highest rated posters, have them printed up, and make them available in our shop!

The artists win a $20 prize right off, and a copy of their poster. We also kick back what amounts to a dollar per each poster sale to the artists. We think it's a really cool way to give artists a little boost, and provide some very cool posters that, at this point, you're almost guaranteed to not see anywhere else.

Submitting artists DO keep their copyrights to their designs. We want to give them a venue to get their work out there, not hoard intellectual property rights.

All of the posters are digital offset prints 12"x18", or 18"x12", printed in limited edition 50 count runs on 80# uncoated cover stock.

We hope you guys like it!

Here are a few examples of winning designs:

[DanielM]

Let me see if I got this right I submit my art to some place in Chicago you run off 50 prints then you send me a buck for everyone you sell so far is that right .What do you do with the other copies?Regards.

[supertackyman]

soooo what resolution is your output?
what print process is used?
what file formats are expected?

[tamlin]

Call me a cynic, but it sounds like a rip-off to me.

Anyone want this thread deleting?

[DanielM]

If it walks like a duck and quacks like a duck odds are it is a duck.Nuff said.

[kokopedal]

I was born at night but I wasn't born last night.

[DanielM]

Originally Posted by kokopedal

I was born at night but I wasn't born last night.

Hey kokopedal I have not heard that expression in years.But it fits Regards

[notjustgraphics]

I dont know guys...

The majority of the posters I looked at sell for $10.00... if the artist is getting $1.00 for each sale and the site owners assume all costs in regards to printing, distribution and site management, it's not an unreasonable proposition.

Im sure lots of artists would be happy to make a little money and get their artwork seen.

The artists name is also attached to the poster everywhere it appears on the site, so theres no attempt to hide the identity of the original creator of the work.

Sounds like an entrepeneurial idea to me and a venue for creative artists to make a little extra cash if they are ok with 50 copies of their work being sold.

Just my $0.02...

*** EDIT

After reading the FAQ's closely, this is how it works:

You submit your artwork for a weekly voting 'contest'.

If you win, you receive $20 and an 18x12 of your work. (Kinda like sending a painter a litho of their hard work)

They then make 50 copies of your design and put them up for sale. When 50 copies sell, you get $50. When 100 copies sell you get $100 and when 500 copies sell you get $500. (So much for the limited run of 50 posters)

You're not gonna get rich, but hey.. if you win, you'll at least get the initial $20...

Cheers

[turvas]

If it doesn't include an actual contract, I'm so not there.

[notjustgraphics]

Wow.. i really don't get the total opposition to this...

Everything is right there in the open... if it's not for you then understandably, don't participate, but i dont think anyone is trying to rip anyone off here...

Its no different than the majority of stock photography sites or most art gallery agreements... although with most of them, the artist has to substantially fund the printing.

This is of course, all based on the assumption that the creators of the website actually do what is said on their website. No contract in the world can protect you from being burned... it only gives you recourse in the legal system to seek compensation... which is probably seldom worth the trouble.

Bewildered I be.

[turvas]

Well... It's kinda what I do... I'm usually outnumbered and in the opposition.

[agentxi]

take a look at the whole site before coming to a conclusion,

My first reactions are to reject it immediately as some sort of scam, or way to rip off the artist again, Which is understandable, cuz as artists, we are often considered the lowest rung on the ladder, when it comes to respected jobs, or respected for teh work we do. But my mind is better at ease after seeing some profiles displayed on the "featured artist" section, these seem like real people, etc... Anyways, I do feel uncomfortable about the whole thing, but on the other hand, as mike has mentioned, it does seem legit.

[tamlin]

I think, on balance, that Mike is probably right. It's just that I've seen phony "competition" scams before: the organisers invite artists to submit their work in the hope of winning the "prize" - usually a place in an exhibition, a nominal cash prize or something of that sort. The problem is that in the small print (which nobody reads, right?) there is a clause that says all submissions become the property of the competition organisers. The "winner" may well receive their "prize", but the organisers get a stack of free artwork to do with what they will.

[DanielM]

There is a old carny expression you pays your nickel you takes your ride.Regards

[posterbored]

Hey guys -

Wow, I didn't really expect there to be this many replies here. I was just checking our referring sites stats, saw the number of visits, and decided to check back in on this thread.

Let me answer a few concerns that were brought up.

1. First of all, you're not assigning all rights to us. We are so not interested in keeping anyone's copyrights...we aren't Threadless, we are two people doing this out of their apartment, and we can't pay $2000 for a winning submission. Twenty bucks is nowhere near enough to hand over any copyrights. You're simply licensing the work to us to sell on the site, and besides the initial $20, we give you 10% along the way. We're small and relatively unknown at the moment, so it's a slow crawl to 50 posters at this point, but we're growing, and we're going to be featured in an issue of TimeOut Chicago within the next two weeks, so that should help.

It's basically like another poster here said: If you aren't interested in participating for what we can afford to pay right now, then don't. No big. Or just go ahead and wait until we can afford to up the amount of the prizes.

2. We're not a scam. I don't even know what else to say to this. I mean, it's all laid out on the site in a pretty straightforward way. My name is Bill, my girlfriend's name is Annie, and we love posters, we love Threadless, and we thought this would be a really cool way to combine the two. We each have an arts background (myself, writing, her, theater), most everyone we know is an artist of some kind, and we would love it if eventually PB got to the point where submitting artists were offered other work through the strength of their submissions to the site, much like the way it happens now with Threadless and Deviant Art.

We have a really messy dining room table and a fishtank that needs a little cleaning if anyone wants to get a picture of what our "scam" office looks like.

3. Supertackyman asked: soooo what resolution is your output?
what print process is used?
what file formats are expected?

We do digital offset prints from an Indigo printer. We have a little printing company here in Chicago that runs the prints for us. The file formats that work the best are high-res .pdfs. A few of our submissions (chromeo and obsolete, among them) are vector art, which has turned out some very nice looking posters.

So, yeah. Bottom line: we're for real, and we're enjoying a bit of modest success selling the posters we have at what we think is a really affordable price to a seemingly very appreciative audience. If you want to check up on us a bit more, take a look at this thread over at the SomethingAwful forums:

The Something Awful Forums

You'll read it and see that the people posting over there are submitters and customers. You'll also read that we're trying to perfect our method of shipping posters out. Hopefully you'll read it, feel at ease, and start submitting some work. We could honestly use some more great submissions.

If anyone has any other questions, please let us know. I'll keep a close eye on this thread.

Thanks!

Bill & Annie
posterbored.com