innerTee

Inkscape – open source vector graphics

// May 24th, 2006 // 5 Comments » // Artist Q&A, Fashion & Tees, General

I was asked this week about our ‘open source’ claim and that if there was any other applications out there other than Illustrator, Freehand, etc. that were vector based and open source as well. Turns out there is – Inkscape Draw Freely!

I’ve been using it for a few weeks now and its pretty good. There are a few less bells & whistles than the big apps but for the price you can’t beat it! Check it out and let us know what you think. You can download the XP and MAC version here.

[tags]inkscape, vector, graphics[/tags]

Innertee – open source screen printed apparel

// May 17th, 2006 // 8 Comments » // Artist Q&A, General

As we get closer to launch we’re being asked a lot, what makes Innertee different? Or what’s better about Innertee? Or just… why?

Well first of all because we are t-shirt addicts and can’t live without them. With that driving us we just weren’t satisfied with the print on-demand sites that are out there. Not that they don’t do a good job, they do to an extent but being shirt snobs we wanted something more like what we wear everyday. Good quality, screen printed shirts.

Screen printing? On-demand? Open-source? Serious? Yes, we are very serious! We know its going to be a challenge but we’re up for it. We will be offering kick-ass custom screen printed shirts that are designed by you and give a good chunk of what we sell back to the artists. We are also going to build a lot of tools into the site that let you share your mixes and art elements with your friends through any way you can think of (more on elements & mixes later).

So ask questions, make suggestions and welcome to Innertee!

[tags]Innertee, screenprinting, opensource, print on demand, t-shirts, crowdsourcing[/tags]

coworking is the new hotness

// May 12th, 2006 // No Comments » // General

Alright, I didn’t think of this Google told me to but its still cool. I recently became a pinkomarketing convert (more on that later, I’m still in training) and as such joined the Google group linked off the wiki. Google told me that a group I might also be interested in was the coworking group so I clicked on over to check it out.

Turns out coworking is very similar to being spaces, a topic we’ve been talking about here in Austin for a while now. Its kinda like Starbucks for people that actually want to work and might do that work longer than it takes to drink a $7 coffee. I also remembered the recent update to being spaces regarding existing coworking businesses. Two existing varitions of coworking are the Village Quill in Tribeca that is a self described ‘writer’s loft’ and Paragraph also targeted at writers. My favortive idea has actually gone out of business but Two Rooms was a non-profit that provided day care services as well as office space for parents that are freelancers, pretty cool.

I’m not sure these examples are exactly what coworking aims to be but I think the general idea is the same – cool, shared work space that can be rented and that provides a sense of community for everyone that you can’t get hiding from the kids in your upstairs office.

Now, if you could mashup coworking with minipreneurism and allow space for small local businesses to support and enhance the coworking space that would really kick ass.

[tags]pinkomarketing, coworking, being space, mashup, minipreneur[/tags]

Innertee is customer made

// May 8th, 2006 // No Comments » // Mass Customization

I hate to keep pitching the same old links but the folks over at Trendwatching.com (same guys as Springwise) just posted an update to their CUSTOMERMADE trend is it really good and a great fit for what we are doing here at [tag]Innertee[/tag].

I won’t go through all of the cool ideas listed (although open source beer sounds like something I need to be a part of) but I think the point they make about altering consumer expectations is really good. It makes sense that once someone has participated in a [tag]customermade[/tag] service model that going back to the same top-down ‘we decide what you like’ business model is uninteresting and even frustrating. Hopefully we can be a part of altering those expectations when we launch next month. Will be exciting to see how innerTee is used by our customers and what new concepts are created from the input and feedback we get.

[tags]co-creation, open source[/tags]

Story-driven fashion

// May 4th, 2006 // 1 Comment » // Fashion & Tees

Just back from our week-long trip to the Florida Keys and have been catching up on things.

Found this concept on my favorite business idea genetrator Springwise (as well as Addicteed). They have coined another cool micro-business trend that seems pretty cool. Story-driven fashion is described as:

Like a wearable magazine , T-post is a t-shirt subscription based on news stories. Every six weeks, the Swedish company takes a new item that has caught their attention, and designs the next t-shirt based on that story.

Seems like a really cool idea and the shirt subscription model has been around for a while with the Threadless guys and a number of small hand-screened indy shops offering something similar. Adding timely, current event driven concepts seems like a no-brainer.