Zazzle Blog

First of all, we want to thank all of you that submitted designs for the Earth Day contest! We were amazed by the quality and variety of the entries. Everyone really captured the spirit of Earth Day and showed great support for conservation and protecting the planet that we call home. The response has been incredibly strong and we can’t wait to launch more contests – stay tuned and visit the contest center for new announcements! This has definitely been a difficult judging process, but without any further delay … the winner is:

“Natural Beauty – Preserve It!” by Melita Matzko (litabug). She will be receiving Adobe Creative Suite 3 as well as a spotlight on the Contributor tab. Great job Melita!

You can read more about the contest and view other submissions at the contest center. Runner up entries included:

• EarthDay- Our Choices, Their Future by Laurel Latto (donnabellas) from San Diego, USA
• global warming by jojy54
• Earth Tree by willapuerta
• Live Life Cleaner by Dan Campos (DCD_designs)
• Celebrate Earth Day! 4/22/2007 by Jessie (Jessie_M) from Delaware, USA
• Earth Day Tree by Amanda Elyse (amandaelyse)
• Don’t Pollute T-shirt by Justin Aerni (justinaerni) from WA, USA
• Recycle Everything – Save the Planet! by Yannis (yanmos)
• Home Sweet Home by totallypainted
• Earth Day shirt by Melissa (sweetcheeks72) from NC, USA
• Siamang Save the World T-shirt by Brian Demeter (briandemeter) from FL, USA
• earthday by Leticia Plate (letile) from Portland, USA
• Green_the new Black by Joseph Kohl (josephkohl)

We also wanted to spotlight some of the wonderful international submissions we received:

• Care About the Earth by Monica Christensen (VolcanoKitten) from Denmark
• Save the World … Don’t be a mother nature hater by totallygraffiti from Newcastle, UK
• power flower by Asztalos Krisztina (dakini) from Budapest, Hungary
• Listen! … the Earth is crying out! by Patrick Hedderman (pheddermah) from Dublin, Ireland

The Zazzle team has been blown away by the quality of designs submitted to the Earth Day contest. There’s been over 300 entries thus far and there is still four hours left for folks to submit their designs.

See the entries | Submit a design

Keep up the great work! We’ll be announcing the winner on Sunday, April 22nd.

Much like Zazzle, Digg.com embraces the values of community and user generated content. So when I heard they were having a party in downtown SF, I just had to go (free drinks helps too). It was a blast to check out all the new stuff Digg is going to be offering now, like the API and Flash/Apollo integration. Here are some shots from the event, including pics of Zazzlers (and yours truly) with tech celebs Kevin Rose (Digg Founder) and Martin Sargent (formely of TechTV, now of the podcast Infected):

(Permalink)

Gotta love when a plan comes together…Recently members of the Center for Marine Biodiversity & Conservation (wow try saying that ten times fast) worked with Zazzle to create an awareness postcard to communicate the warning messages of the Global Climate change. One of the organizers, Ben, took a little time out of his busy day to tell me about why they chose to do a postcard handout with Zazzle…

“We decided that a postcard would be a good way to communicate this [global warming] message in a broad way. While fliers reach a similar range and number of people, we wanted to distinguish ourselves from all the other groups on and off campus that hand out fliers. A postcard differs because not only can they communicate a message, but people like to collect them or send them to family and friends. And with a fun image, clear text, and CMBC students out in the community actively handing them out and educating the public on Earth Day, we thought there would be extra incentive for our audience to hang onto them and to have the opportunity to expose them in a very unimposing way to another very serious issue related to the ocean…”

Here’s the link to their beautiful postcard. Got a cool story like that? Well you should tell it to me, I love story time…

(Permalink)

Just got back from the Web 2.0 Expo in downtown SF, and it was a blast. Lotsa companies, big and small. Of course, this being a conference about next-gen internet and user generated content, a bunch of Zazzlers were there to spread the love and learn about new companies that we might want to work with in the future. The awareness of Zazzle amongst attendees was pretty solid and we got lots of warm fuzzies… nice! Also, on a side note, our friends from LuckyOliver had a booth and wanted me to give a good ol’ Zazzle Blog shout out to JerBear (some may call him Jeremy)… Hey JerBear!

Here are some pics from the show, including me in front of some cool booths. I collected my bounty of corporate swag and even entered a drawing for CS3 (Zazzle employees aren’t allowed to enter the Zazzle Contest for CS3). However, I didn’t complete my mission of collecting a pocket full of USB thumb drives… not one company was handing them out (for shame!). Future exhibitors of trade shows that I attend: give me thumb drives or give me death. Also, on a final note, check out Rob’s shot of some dude who wasn’t at the expo, but is bound to be at this Saturday’s APE (see you there buddy, see you there…).

If you asked me yesterday what I thought was possible to be made from sand, I probably would have just come up with sand castles and that mess on my kitchen floor (take of your shoes before you come in the house!). But nothing remotely like the stuff Ilana Yahav is coming up with… check out her moving and living sand murals (choreographed to music). So, next time you’re at the beach, give that a go yourself (ya, riiiiiight). If you can find a more creative “sand piece”, post it in the comments! I double dare you.

(Permalink)

**UPDATE (4/17/07)**: So, Patrick here, we received some questions about this mysterious Charlieo character and how/why he posted to the official Zazzle Blog… the truth is, he actually is a Zazzler himself, working in our esteemed Operations department… ya see, he gets really depressed all the time because he falls in love with all the incredible products being produced everyday… then, to his dismay, they are all shipped out en masse!… all gone, leaving him alone yet again. Deprived of his beloved, high quality on-demand products. So, his depression sets in, and the only thing that keeps him going for another day is the promise of yet another huge batch of orders. But don’t fear, he’s actually quite personable and approachable (before shipping time, of course) and you can expect more great posts from him in the future! **END UPDATE**

Today was an interesting (and depressing) day. Instead of crying at my desk, I decided to share my sadness with the free world by luring vulnerable bystanders into conversations about their insecurities. Pathetic, I know, but at this point I am without shame. I’m terrible at starting conversations on my own, so I figured I’d use one of my Zazzle products to do the job for me. Weapon of choice: my “Tell me what you don’t like about yourself” shirt.

At first, everyone I walked by was freaked out by me and refused to make eye contact. Not a big deal, I’m used to it. Then it happened! A guy came up to me and said, “I keep working at jobs that pay nothing.” I responded with a generic “Yeah…sorry” and then I took off. It was awesome! On my way back to my car, I got a few more hits:

- “Like you care.”

- “What? Are you a therapist or something?” [*Really* angry lady]

- “Do you have an hour? It’s a long list.”

What I learned Today: Lots of people have issues, and they’ll blab about them if you wear cool shirts.

Stay sad,

Charlieo

(Permalink)

WooHoo! We’re at the halfway point for the first Zazzle contest and it’s been awesome to see some of the great designs that have been submitted thus far. A few of you have asked some good questions and we’ve included the responses below.

Question: Can I submit more than one design? What happens if I submit multiple designs?

• Z: You may submit multiple designs but only the first design you enter is eligible to win the contest. The other designs you enter are not official entries and cannot win the contest regardless of their rating, views, sales, etc. In addition, you may only enter one official entry per user so if you have multiple galleries on Zazzle, only your first entry is eligible to win.

Question: Can I submit different product types, i.e. a t-shirt and a mug?

• Z: Only t-shirts are eligible to win the prize. In addition, please do not submit the same design on multiple products. This will not improve your chances of winning.

Question: Can I submit designs that I published before the contest began? If so, how will the voting/rating/sales/etc. from before the contest impact the winner selection?

• Z: You may submit designs that were published before the contest began, all you need to do is add the tag “EarthDayContest2007″ to the product. However, we will only be counting the rating, views, sales, etc. from from the contest began (April 4th) to determine the top 25 entries and the winner.

Question: Can I win if I’m not in the US?

• Z: We absolutely accept and appreciate all entries from *around the world* in celebration of the Earth. In addition, all submissions will be included in the Earth Day submission pool. However, only entries from US residents will be eligible for winning the contest prize due to legal restrictions on running a contest with a prize. We’re exploring ways to open this up and we’ll keep you posted!

Good luck!