I love tshirts. I love geek tshirts. Never am I happier than when explaining that "no, in the context of the Tshirt 10 means 2, not 10" or "the wee arrow means greater than". Or "no, it's not just an arbritrary orange, it's a software company logo". One of the problems with these Tees is that they wear out, get solder burned, or get toasted to a half sized crisp in the dryer. Ordering a fresh one should be easy. But it isn't. You look inside the average Tshirt and this is what you get:

Useful. Threadless get closer with this:

Books have the ISBN. Tshirts should have a ISTN. A standardised system for organising tshirt designs. It would make tshirt searching so much easier. I propose a 4 part system limited to 16 characters.

TGEK-BINP-MBAA-XL

producer - design - item - size

thinkgeek - binary people - mens black - extra large

The first and last sections are standardised. So you always know where it was bought and what size it was. The central two parts are self managed by the producer. They get to name the design, and use whatever code suits them for the item.

One spin off I can foresee is a subtle sleeve or back of neck print of the producer code on the shirt. So that when I see a shirt on the street I can just glance at the sleeve and note "right, he got that shirt from GYOI! - must check them out". Benefits the shop, benefits me in finding a new shirt, clutters up my sleeve a little.

Some central area, nothing more complicated than a wiki, could allow producers to claim a producer code and then optionally maintain a list of design codes on that site. This would have promotional advantages, and would help them to show they were first with a design when they get ripped off on cafepress forty times.

Adding structure to the chaotic world of t-shirts. Hardly an earth shattering global innovation, but would be cool. Comment if you want to reserve a cool 4 letter acronym!

The sketch (May I apologise for the quality of photography. I seriously need a new flash!)