Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

The dangers of California's legislation to censor 3D printing

eff.org

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

281–290 of 491 posts

Re: The dangers of California's legislation to censor 3D printing

#281

Post by binkHN »

horsawlarway wrote: post #38

Personally, I see this as an assault on 3d printing more than any real attempt to regulate guns. I own several 3d printers. If I wanted to make something resembling a firearm I'd go to home depot WAY before I bothered 3d printing parts. You basically just need a metal tube, and well... a pipe from home depot does that much better than trying to 3d print something much less reliable. So given we don't do this regulati…

It's total bullshit; I should be able to print all the guns I want. Prop guns, plastic replicas of my guns; I shouldn't have to go though this BS.

Re: The dangers of California's legislation to censor 3D printing

#282

Post by marcus_holmes »

nine_k wrote: post #276
marcus_holmes wrote: post #217

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I have never lived in a country where people are allowed to keep guns. That scares the crap out of me. Not just because of random strangers. I went through a mental health crisis, and there was a dark time where if I had had a gun I would be dead now. No amount of lockers or safe boxes or mental health tests would have saved me from that gun. And wtf do you need a gun for anyway? I have never, not once, been in a sit…

> And wtf do you need a gun for anyway? One of the reasons that Switzerland, a country te size of Bay Area, with 9M current population, has not been overrun by the many wars in Europe for last 200 years is that every citizen is expected to fight back, without formally joining a military force for that. All men have to serve in the military for a couple of months to get the basic training, obtain and master a small ar…

> This is very close to the idea that an armed population is a backstop against tyranny, but much better implemented.

The last few months have disproved this completely. Literal plain-clothes masked thugs seizing people off the streets en masse, and there have only been a handful of cases of armed civilians resisting.

And I disagree that Switzerland preserved itself during WW2 because the forces that stomped all over the professional armies of Europe are afraid of an armed civilian population. That just doesn't make sense.

Re: The dangers of California's legislation to censor 3D printing

#283

Post by Ferret7446 »

engineer_22 wrote: post #242
marcus_holmes wrote: post #217

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I have never lived in a country where people are allowed to keep guns. That scares the crap out of me. Not just because of random strangers. I went through a mental health crisis, and there was a dark time where if I had had a gun I would be dead now. No amount of lockers or safe boxes or mental health tests would have saved me from that gun. And wtf do you need a gun for anyway? I have never, not once, been in a sit…

I'm sorry you went through a difficult time of your life, I can relate. I would like to point out a gun doesn't make destroying oneself any easier. They are heavy and cold and they have a particular smell, they taste like metal, and the hole in the end of the barrel so strongly implies destruction that even pointing it at oneself carries incredible gravity. Many people that purchase a gun for this purpose abandon the…

Well said, I will also add that the source of all fear is ignorance, and that includes everything, from guns to disease to imaginary monsters. You do not cure it through avoidance, quite the opposite.

Re: The dangers of California's legislation to censor 3D printing

#284

Post by [deleted] »

nine_k wrote: post #266
lynndotpy wrote: post #261

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> a proof of mental sanity A "proof of mental sanity" would be a far more concerning overreach than 3D printer bans or gun bans, especially as we see things which are mandatory in a society become something tantamount to personhood. I don't really know how one would even envision implementing such a thing.

Can you get a driver's license if you're visibly insane? The same standard should apply to getting a gun. A gun is comparably lethal.

[deleted]

Re: The dangers of California's legislation to censor 3D printing

#285

Post by raven12345 »

fasterik wrote: post #198
jlarocco wrote: post #195

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Unfortunately, America is just as bad, without the benefit of solving problems. https://truthout.org/articles/ice-agents-are-using-family-se... https://news.un.org/en/story/2026/01/1166816

> America is just as bad The Human Rights Index for the United States dropped from 0.93 to 0.83 in 2025, which is concerning. Meanwhile, China scores 0.18, which is significantly worse. For comparison, countries that score higher than China include Iran, Russia, and Venezuela. Globally, China is 6th percentile on the Human Rights Index. The United States is 65th percentile. That puts the U.S. well below most develope…

So this index is just a joke, how Iran, Russia, and Venezuela higher than China?

Re: The dangers of California's legislation to censor 3D printing

#286

Post by Ferret7446 »

lewdev wrote: post #109
hypeatei wrote: post #55

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> any real attempt to regulate guns Any real attempt would need to be at the national level, not that I would advocate for it, but it's simply a pipe dream to create a "gun free zone" in a country with 100s of millions of firearms. There are plenty of gun enthusiasts in California, they just don't flaunt it or talk about it.

"regulate guns" does not equate to "gun free."

And "gun free" does not equate to "gun free" either, it equates to "only criminals have guns"

Re: The dangers of California's legislation to censor 3D printing

#287

Post by jandrewrogers »

linksnapzz wrote: post #258
rolph wrote: post #111

Earlier quoted context omitted.

[Primers are a legitimately difficult thing to manufacture] thats a problem that may not endure. if a firearm is reengineered to use an electrode to detonate charge rather than a chemical primer, there is no need for murcury fulminate, just a piezo electric spark generator, and a few square cm of cerebral cortex.

AFAIK, nobody uses fulminate of mercury in primers anymore.

Yes, those were abandoned a very long time ago. Mercury materially damages steel alloys. Using it in primers slowly eats your barrel.

Re: The dangers of California's legislation to censor 3D printing

#288

Post by caconym_ »

terbo wrote: post #250
caconym_ wrote: post #135

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Reminds me of the sUAS legislation crushing the R/C flying hobby. Vague allusions to "safety" are constantly being thrown around, but in fact it seems that big companies are lobbying to claim the airspace for drone delivery and similar autonomous BVLOS operations.

And as a result there are a bunch of sub 250g long range digital builds and RTFs that achieve the same as the drones people flew pre remote ID..

Flying BVLOS is still illegal (including using goggles without a spotter) and basically nobody in the FPV hobby (non part 107) runs remoteid or registers their drones, even if they're over 250g. IDK what the AMA club field guys are doing, but they've all got FRIAs anyway.

In the FPV hobby, interest in smaller drones has increased, but I'm not really sure whether to attribute that more to regulations or just the fact that more components are available now to build smaller drones that can fly in public spaces without interfering with other people's usage, or even inside your own home. Overall it feels like the main impact of the regulations is to keep people away from the hobby entirely, since people who get into it inevitably start ignoring the more onerous rules sooner or later.

I'm expecting it to get worse, anyway. And the guys who fly DJI-style consumer drones are fucked, sub250 or not.

Re: The dangers of California's legislation to censor 3D printing

#289

Post by Aurornis »

horsawlarway wrote: post #38

Personally, I see this as an assault on 3d printing more than any real attempt to regulate guns. I own several 3d printers. If I wanted to make something resembling a firearm I'd go to home depot WAY before I bothered 3d printing parts. You basically just need a metal tube, and well... a pipe from home depot does that much better than trying to 3d print something much less reliable. So given we don't do this regulati…

> I own several 3d printers. If I wanted to make something resembling a firearm I'd go to home depot WAY before I bothered 3d printing parts. You basically just need a metal tube, and well... a pipe from home depot does that much better than trying to 3d print something much less reliable.

I agree that this legislation is not good, but you apparently aren’t aware of the large communities dedicated to 3D printing guns.

The first 3D printed gun was making headlines 13 years ago and since then it’s turned into a semi-underground fascination.

You aren’t going to be fashioning a gun out of a pipe from Home Depot more easily than the designs these groups are playing with.

Many of the subreddits, Discords, Facebook groups and other communities have started to get shut down since a 3D printed gun was used in a high profile murder recently.

There are a lot of comments in this comment section from people unaware of how big these communities are. I’m not supporting these legislative attempts to interfere with 3D printers but you really should know some of the context.

Re: The dangers of California's legislation to censor 3D printing

#290

Post by devilbunny »

esseph wrote: post #268
iwontberude wrote: post #105

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Like everything in the United States, it’s actually gun manufacturers that want to clamp down on this cottage industry which threatens their profits. I don’t buy for a second that this is some gun control attempt.

> Like everything in the United States, it’s actually gun manufacturers that want to clamp down on this cottage industry which threatens their profits. I have 0 reason to believe this. That is some pretty wild speculation, and a terribly risky proposition for any company because they would instantly get blackballed by the 2a community.

I think a fundamental problem here is that people who don’t know any 2A/RKBA people think it’s like most political opinions. Oh, you’re a gun guy, you’re a Republican who like country music and hates them black folk.

It isn’t. It’s a group of people, some of whom are country-music-loving Republicans who hate them black folk, but who also include a lot of them black folk, a lot of Democrats, and a lot of people who hate country music. It is a group that has decided that one issue is more important than anything else to them. And they vote. For you, if you are for them, but for your opponent, if you are not. They will primary you. They do not care if D or R is next to your name. In fact they love pro-gun D politicians, because it’s a chance to pull that party into respecting all constitutional rights.

The NRA is massively successful because of this. They do one thing, and everyone in it knows that. They don’t have to agree on anything else, because if you can’t have guns, the rest of the politics is irrelevant.

A company that made the slightest anti-2A movement would be dead by sunset the next day. No store would carry their product. No consumer in the know would buy their product.

Post reply on HN