2005-10-07

About ST-v-SW.Net: The Store

Where the hell did that come from?

Spur of the moment thing, really. I was sitting there really thinking about buying a shirt online that featured a hysterical re-do of the Sistine Chapel when it dawned on me that I wouldn't mind having an ST-v-SW.Net shirt.

Are you making money off of it?

No, not really. I just went ahead and put the shop up because I thought it was nifty. I don't expect to sell anything.

In any case, the shop is free for the person who runs it (i.e. I don't have to pay them for it) . . . people make money off of them by putting in a mark-up. I went ahead and marked things up by just enough to get to the next integer or half-integer (i.e. their weirdly-priced $16.45 shirts would go to $17.00), but that hardly counts. Even if a shirt a week were to be sold, at the end of a year I'd have, oh, about twenty-five bucks. In short, if I were in it for the money I'd put up ad banners or a Paypal contribution link or something.

In any case, though, any money earned (i.e. all 55 cents, since of course I did buy a shirt) will be used for upkeep of ST-v-SW.Net.

Is this legal?

"I will make it legal."

Okay, well, maybe not. But seriously, I'm not infringing on anyone's copyrights or anything . . . hence the boring designs which don't feature ships fighting or character names or quotes or anything fun like that. The closest I come is with the use of the site symbol chevron in its "Battle of Britain" configuration . . . something very similar to the site symbol chevron was recently used in "In A Mirror, Darkly"[ENT4]. However, my symbol came before that, and is sufficiently different than any predecessor.

Further, with the BoB modification it is an independent design using elements of an independent design that is a formerly-unique variation of a previously-little-known Trek design. That alone makes it more original than most TV or songs available today.

I have this great idea for a new shirt/whatever . . .

Send it in! If it's really cool I'll see if I can whip one up for you and add it to the store. Or you can make one yourself via the folks who are providing the store for me.

Anyway, I figured this would be useful for clearing up any potential questions. If I get questions not related to the ones above I'll edit this accordingly.

2 comments:

Anonymous said...

The "Rabid Fanboy" would be nice in a less eye-melting color.
Maybe a dark blue or green?

Author said...

I'll see what I can do.

As for me, I got my shirt in the mail yesterday, and am wearing it today. It's a one-off I designed just for me, similar to the "Battle" Basic T. I have to say, I'm surprised at how well it turned out. Despite being only about three inches tall, and a print on fabric, the detail level is quite surprising. The black border line just inside the outer edge, for instance, is remarkably strong.

I don't know how well it will hold up in the wash or over time, but I'm quite pleased with it right now.