Sometimes I wish I just saved up more money and bought one of those printers you just plug in and press print on. You know one of them nice curved ergonomic boxes like the breadmaker those gun guys use?

You know then I would be talking about tweaking design issues already, of how using a particular script in FreeCAD has enabled me to get inward rotation at the point of flux...or whatever those pretentious conversations go like. Then I could start taking orders to print whatever people want.

I could just start taking orders anyways. Thats what all the Startups are doing these days. Prove you're somewhere in the design stage of what could be something revolutionary and people pre-order purely on the strength of the idea of the future product.

I saw a guy flying a Quadcopter today. Probably just one of those straight-out-of-the-box breadmaker style ones, that you don't even have to assemble, you just plug it in and charge it, ready for Sunday afternoon by the canal.

I suppose I asked for it when I decided to assemble my own printer. I am more looking forward to printing out the parts for the next printer than anything else. I actually own a breadmaker but I'd rather knead for 20 minutes when I make bread so that my palms hurt and somehow it tastes better.

Its called the Ikea-effect when people get more satisfaction from a product that they have assembled themselves than if they just bought the pre-made version. "It has more character" is the way we summed it up in my family. It might be shoddier than the rest but its mine. It may not be the best reprap in the world but boy do we love 'im!

I feel a lot better now :D

Here's what Basti sent me. Suppose I should put my views out there.

I can't print one anyway believe it or not so what I say isn't yet that important. I'm not scared though, if you want to become a criminal and buy on the black market you can. If you put your mind to it you can easily engineer yourself a life where you use guns on a daily basis, high powered sniper rifles for that matter. Any able bodied person can join the army if they put their mind to it.

People in America are being all public about doing this and probably not paying too much attention to who downloads the files, but don't worry the NSA is. Is it a good thing that they can't do anything about this? Is it good that people might be printing out serious arsenals?

They might have been making guns anyway. There are people all over the world buying guns from eachother anyway. Most of the people killed on a normal day aren't killed with a gun anyway.

That pretty much deals with all the big questions, no need to do any analyzing to figure out it don't make much difference. When somebody, hopefully the Singularity, comes along and prohibits all combustion of fossil fuels - or as close as we can get to apocalyptic without all dying - its all gonna come down to who can make the most stuff from within walking distance of where they are. Then it becomes important that people can print guns.

At the moment it ain't nothin' new to be able to get guns, maybe its just easier for geeks now. Arm yourselves brothers, lets redress the balance.

Or maybe we should start being scared when you can print a working phaser.
I think I'm gonna stick to blow pipes.

So I tidied up my desk and it spontaneously attracted the attention of my lovely maker wife....

Notice the shiny shininess of the work surface.

These delightful crimbo decorations now adorn our makerspace...

Figured I had to tidy up to get me motivated. Motivation required to manage the last bit of wiring and cable-tying before the so called commissioning. Exciting. Though not as exciting as some of the implications of 3D printing however.


As a philosopher I have been asking the old chestnuts long enough to find a reason for being that puts meaning into my life. Within 6 months I hope to print out replacement parts for my neighbours. Within 1 year I hope I can fix a toy from work overnight. Within 2 years I hope I can print whistles on site and on demand at a demonstration. Within 4 years I hope I can design a specialised printer for making cylindrical symmetrical objects by laying down spiral after spiral after spiral. Within 8 years I hope I have already made a set of printer parts for everyone who knows me and who wants them. Within 16 years I hope to proudly see my daughter and those of her generation using all the silly skills they have subtly and secretly gained for the betterment of the world. In 32 years I hope to have played a part in dramatic changes in the lives of more than a million people, without having gone to the Singularity University. The Singularity will have happened before we get 64 years into the future but I hope to have survived. I think if you make enough, then you will too.