http://www.post-gazette.com/pg/10257/1087450-96.stm
reprint of the article for those of us without a NYT login to avoid the trouble of getting in.
3-D Printing Is Spurring a Manufacturing Revolution
21–26 of 26 posts
Re: 3-D Printing Is Spurring a Manufacturing Revolution
#22One should hire one of the best 3-D printers, and with it, print your own 3-D printer.
You sound like you're joking; some did it: http://reprap.org/wiki/Main_Page
Re: 3-D Printing Is Spurring a Manufacturing Revolution
#23Re: 3-D Printing Is Spurring a Manufacturing Revolution
#24Re: 3-D Printing Is Spurring a Manufacturing Revolution
#25One should hire one of the best 3-D printers, and with it, print your own 3-D printer.
Will self-aware computers be able to reproduce? Based on some optimal energy consumption models (in the future, this code will need to make moral judgments)? Someone's definitely already told them how much energy humans throw off. Then they print out a lollipop that's really a brain implant, and ...Poof... they own us. We feed ourselves to them.
Matrix movie theory be damned, this will have big implications.
Re: 3-D Printing Is Spurring a Manufacturing Revolution
#26I'm really excited for when piracy and IP debates beings to extend to the physical world. It is going to be super entertaining to watch the DRM debacle over my right to print objects.
3D printing of metal is here, if expensive. With that technology in mind, a computer-file gives you the ability to print a specially shaped piece of metal. A piece of metal that turns your legally owned firearm, and turns it into a fully-automatic cop killer that mows down entire preschools.
By the time that idea is exposed to mainstream society, hopefully society's knee-jerk response won't damn the entire industry. (The fact that the piece of metal is easily made today doesn't escape me. Society, however, is not known for acting rationally in response to danger, especially to children.)