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Right now, people are commenting this will enable 3D-printed plastics, but there are mildly expensive (about $1000-$3000) 3D metal printers, and with a bit of m

Right now, people are commenting this will enable 3D-printed plastics, but there are mildly expensive (about $1000-$3000) 3D metal printers, and with a bit of metal-working and gun-smithing skill it should be possible to mass manufacture good-enough, metal guns from those files. So, this lowers a bit the money and skill needed for it, but it's not braindead easy or dirt cheap yet. A decently organized gang will print its own guns in the near future, or paramilitary groups, or insurrectionaries.

ryanmarsh 8y ago
In the US it’s so ridiculously easy to obtain a firearm I don’t know why anyone would bother. A home made (3D printed) firearm is just as likely to kill its operator as anyone else.
- drasticmeasures 8y ago
  It's on the Internet, so this goes beyond the US. I'm thinking gun-controlled areas or conflict areas. I'm also thinking how this potentially shuts down for the FBI entrapping wannabe-insurrectionaries by posing as weapons dealers. Or how non-American gangs will have vast quantities of guns at their disposal, and how that will necessarily change police policy. And how determined and savvy, but dangerous, individuals will more easily (this is the key thing here: more easily, lower barrier of acquisition) get their hands on guns in gun-controlled areas and go on rampages. This will make gun control much more difficult.
  - ryanmarsh 8y ago
    In conflict areas, of which I’m familiar, AK47’s are often easier to obtain than fresh produce.
    - drasticmeasures 8y ago
      And in gun-controlled areas? They would have to control the printers and the digital blueprints as well.
      - ryanmarsh 8y ago
        You mean like Chicago?
    - RyJones 8y ago
      Two notes. I talked with a farmer in Holland a few years ago - I noticed home-made shotguns on the wall, and a home made 22LR. He said he made them more to have them made from plain stock than out of his desire to own guns. He said he could go to the docks in Rotterdam any day and buy a Kalashnikov if he wanted one. I don't think Rotterdam is a conflict area, no matter how stiff the traffic was last month.

ryanmarsh 8y ago

In the US it’s so ridiculously easy to obtain a firearm I don’t know why anyone would bother. A home made (3D printed) firearm is just as likely to kill its operator as anyone else.

drasticmeasures 8y ago
It's on the Internet, so this goes beyond the US. I'm thinking gun-controlled areas or conflict areas. I'm also thinking how this potentially shuts down for the FBI entrapping wannabe-insurrectionaries by posing as weapons dealers. Or how non-American gangs will have vast quantities of guns at their disposal, and how that will necessarily change police policy. And how determined and savvy, but dangerous, individuals will more easily (this is the key thing here: more easily, lower barrier of acquisition) get their hands on guns in gun-controlled areas and go on rampages. This will make gun control much more difficult.
- ryanmarsh 8y ago
  In conflict areas, of which I’m familiar, AK47’s are often easier to obtain than fresh produce.
  - drasticmeasures 8y ago
    And in gun-controlled areas? They would have to control the printers and the digital blueprints as well.
    - ryanmarsh 8y ago
      You mean like Chicago?
  - RyJones 8y ago
    Two notes. I talked with a farmer in Holland a few years ago - I noticed home-made shotguns on the wall, and a home made 22LR. He said he made them more to have them made from plain stock than out of his desire to own guns. He said he could go to the docks in Rotterdam any day and buy a Kalashnikov if he wanted one. I don't think Rotterdam is a conflict area, no matter how stiff the traffic was last month.