French Connection isn't the only fashion brand looking to cash in on an underground internet phenomenon. While the UK retailer is sending freebie seeking lads to Chatroulette to score dates, American Apparel is using the youth power behind LOOKBOOK.nu for its benefit. The invitation-only street-style site born in San Francisco has been growing exponentially for months, and its model is both simple and straightforward: fashionable teens and twentysomethings from around the globe snap photos of themselves in their best ensembles and upload them. Since December 2009, American Apparel has been working with the site to pool together images of LOOKBOOK.nu users in AA garb. "After sorting through nearly a thousand entries, they created a lookbook with almost 80 young people wearing the AA brand from around the world," says PSFK.

150,000 copies of the look book will be printed and sold in American Apparel's 280 stores worldwide. But not all photos featured are the fruit of amateurs' labor. "Some of the LOOKBOOK.nu users in the book who sent in what AA considered were the best contributions have even been reshot by professional photographers and were added to the cover and centerfolds." Much like the brand's "best butt" campaign (not to mention FCUK's spin with Chatroulette), this is a well-executed marketing push looking to bank on user-generated content that comes at little or no cost to the retailer.

Hipster Runoff raises an interesting point: "LOOKBOOK.nu seems to be a place that discourages retail consumerism, since so many users on the site create their own looks in regional thrift stores ... wonder if this was a good way to get ‘cheap labor’ from alternative teens who thought this would elevate their modeling career." The real question is: are the "models" in question being exploited for their personal style? Or is free publicity payment enough for today's highly valued talent of individual sartorial know-how?