Idea Province

Yes I WOULD Rather Be Complaining

Back on February 6, 2008, I posted a list of phrases that Joseph Weisenthal and I came up with for T-shirts and bumper stickers, in an entry titled I’d Rather Be Complaining. Actually, the entry was titled, “I May be Slow, But I’m Fasting,” but “I’d Rather Be Complaining” was one of the ideas. It turns out someone took notice of that entry and took action… The Onion.

On May 27, I saw a “new” Onion T-shirt advertised in The Onion videos section. It’s a gray T-shirt with nothing on it but the exact phrase we pioneered, “I’d Rather Be Complaining.” Their only contribution was to put the phrase mostly in lower-case. They didn’t even come up with a picture or an interesting font! Just copy and paste from Idea Province, take out the capital letters, and boom, there’s your new Onion T-shirt.

I know at the top of this site it says most of the ideas I post are up for grabs, but that obviously didn’t include “I’d Rather Be Complaining”! And even if that was included, I would never have allowed it to be used by a giant profit-seeking news conglomerate, especially one so corrupt that it lies as an official policy.

We were just about to get around to making that shirt. In fact, Joe and I were talking about that exact phrase at a Memorial Day bbq the day before The Onion unveiled its stolen goods for the world to buy. Now we don’t know if we can compete against our own idea. I mean, I’m sure we could make it look more interesting than The Onion did, and it would be a more legit shirt because it wouldn’t be tainted by piracy. But I get about an average of 20 hits per day on this site (one of which no doubt comes from Onion HQ). That’s less than The Onion gets in a second… in its worst nightmare.

I never post pictures to Idea Province, but for the first time, a picture may be called for. Here’s our phrase, as posted on Idea Province:

I’d Rather Be Complaining

And now here’s the “new” Onion T-shirt:

See any similarities?

Wouldn’t you think a lying, stealing news conglomerate could at least email me with a mocking taunt  before they robbed my blog blind? But they didn’t even do that. Once I caught them, Joe and I emailed and called them multiple times; not surprisingly, no one will respond to our queries.

I’m torn about whether I want the T-shirt to be a hit. If it makes The Onion a lot of money, it validates the idea. But then it also teaches The Onion that stealing is okay. And who knows what they’ll steal from Idea Province next? “I’m Pro-Crime and I Vote”? “No Way, Jose! No More Immigration”? Or maybe they’ll start the TV station that only plays failed pilots? No, I better stop. I don’t want to give them any ideas.