3D printing

The small town of Bethlehem, New York purchased a 3D printer and started teaching classes at its public library recently—jumpstarting the community's knowledge of advanced manufacturing and building upon a new way of doing things in a world where physical bookstores are dissappearing.

It's true. Public libraries are reinventing themselves. Today they are becoming less of a place that hosts physical books and more of a center where people collaborate, commune, and learn new things. » Read more

The best way to explain 3D printing to someone is to show them. But since Jeff Moe can’t carry around one of his Lulzbot 3D printers, he has taken to packing 3D-printed parts in his pocket so that he can show them off when he runs into people who aren't familiar with the concept.

"A lot of time when you're explaining it, people are thinking of a 3D movie or something like that," said Moe, CEO of Aleph Objects, the largest manufacturer of open source 3D printers. "I literally carry around parts with me and show people the different things that 3D printers can do because that explains it a lot better," Moe said. » Read more

Belief in a more collaborative process. Perseverence to make things better. Shared knowledge and access for all. These are the things that come to mind when I think about the work the e-NABLE community is doing.

Though they're on a trajectory without a clear future, their vision is crystal. To share what they've created with the world and allow the natural course of innovation and invention to change lives—without the obstacles of patents and the barriers of cost. » Read more

Following up on the recent review of the Maker's Manifesto, I ran across the book Makers: The New Industrial Revolution by Chris Anderson. Anderson is a former Editor in Chief of Wired and no stranger to the economic paradoxes of peer-production and open source. He has written about both in previous books The Long Tail: Why the Future of Business Is Selling Less of More and Free: The Future of a Radical Price.

In his most recent book, Anderson examines the historical parallels between the Maker movement and the second Industrial Revolution, » Read more

Just a month ago, our geek wish of getting a 3D printer was granted: a Makerbot Replicator 2X arrived at our office. Since then we've been busy learning by trial and error about the possibilities and limitations of 3D printing. You can read my review of the Printrbot Simple Kit.

So far, in short, I can describe 3D printing as: Building an object, by depositing layers, and creating every layer by drawing it with melted plastic. The key to understanding 3D printing, and thus learning how to do it better, is to think about the objects as a stack of layers. Then, consider how the layers will look like as they are being stacked. » Read more

If you're looking around for 3D printers that are both inexpensive and open source friendly, the Printrbot Simple Kit will probably catch your attention.

This Kit sells for close to $300, and for our team required a full-day of DIY assembly, though skilled makers might be able to put it together in four hours or so. Our team was made up of three PhDs and two R&D engineers, and it took us close to eight hours to complete the assembly, which of course included some philosophical and licensing discussions and a couple of trips to the hardware store. It was indeed a lot of fun! » Read more

3D printing is set to disrupt multiple industries thanks to its unique position at the intersection of three important trends in technology: the Internet of Things, our growing desire to personalize our things, and the coming revolution in the way things get delivered to us.

Operating at this unique trifecta, 3D printing promises to democratize the design and build process, allowing consumers to create their own stuff from scratch and take the concept of mass customization to an entirely new level. As modern consumers have come to expect very custom experiences, it’s no longer enough for manufacturers and merchants to offer products in a wide range of colors and styles. The ability to customize nearly everything is now commonplace, even expected, in products ranging from T-shirts to tennis shoes and iPods to M&Ms. 3D printing delivers the ability to customize quickly and inexpensively without worrying about minimum production runs. » Read more

Open source news for your reading pleasure.

December 9-13, 2013

We scoured the web for some of this week's most interesting open source-related news stories so you don't have to. Here's what we found:

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Open source news this week: September 23 - 27, 2013

What other open source-related news stories did you read about this week? Share them with us in the comments section. Follow us on Twitter where we share these stories in real time.

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Maker Machine is a mobile makerspace that brings 3D printers, DIY robotics, and interactive art to primary schools, libraries, museums and youth clubs. The project is currently fundraising for a tour of Australia to bring our workshop to schools around the country.

Started by myself and Sam Nikolsky, two Melbourne Industrial Designers, Maker Machine transforms the traditional classroom into a high tech workshop.