6 ms·

Why 3-D Printing Isn't Like Virtual Reality

33 points by robdoherty2 15y ago

marshray 15y ago
From the title I'd expected an article making the argument that 3-D printing was unlike virtual reality, or an explanation of how it came to be unlike VR. OK, now I see that there was an inline link http://www.technologyreview.com/blog/mimssbits/27526/ http://www.technologyreview.com/blog/mimssbits/27526/ to an article called "Why 3-D Printing Will Go the Way of Virtual Reality". This article's only mention of VR is the claim that "3-D printing, like VR before it, is one of those technologies that suggest a trend of long and steep adoption driven by rapid advances on the systems we have now." Which is not really about VR at all, only saying that VR is an example of a technology which was not adopted at the rate at which its promise would imply. So reading between the lines, collectively these authors would seem to imply that 3-D printing, whatever its merits and limitations, as a technology must have almost nothing to do with virtual reality. Otherwise, these authors surely would have mentioned it. Interesting how the term "virtual reality" predates the term "linkbait" by many years.
- Maciek416 15y ago
  Agreed, the almost non sequitur mention of VR feels like a straw man. The authors seem to sort of dismiss VR as a fad that disappeared with the headsets and Powergloves. Meanwhile, every year, we're seeing a steady march upwards in GPU power, mass-market uptake of 3D immersive gaming, and devices like the Wii or Kinect selling like crazy in numbers that would have been unthinkable in Jaron Lanier's heyday. VR, or aspects of its original "dream", are steadily making inroads into daily life. If anything, 3D printing will be exactly like VR in the sense that it will have an initial burst of excitement in the mass media, followed by a long steady march toward ubiquitous, banal, take-for-grantedness.
fraserharris 15y ago
This is profound: "Something interesting happens when the cost of tooling-up falls. There comes a point where your production runs are small enough that the economies of scale that justify container ships from China stop working. There comes a point where making new things isn't a capital investment but simply a marginal one." The West can return to manufacturing if it becomes a function of the creative class. This could be a major trend for the next decade.
- marshray 15y ago
  It is a very interesting possibility. My concern is that if this technology truly is revolutionary but does not carve out a sufficiently large piece of the pie for the traditional parasites (e.g., distribution moguls and IP lawyers) it could very easily be outlawed. (Probably not effectively, but note the number of people who are in jail today for replicating a plant.) This will be hard since 3D printing potentially increases wealth with much less involvement of money. So how will they take their slice of pie? If it really is a disruptive technology, there will be plenty of cases where the economic advantages eliminate someone's job. I'm old enough to remember discussion about US factory workers being replaced by robots. Factory automation turned out to be far from the main threat to US factory workers' jobs.
  - chii 15y ago
    "main threat to US factory workers' jobs." There is no such thing as threat - a factory worker who cannot compete MUST be selected out, and replaced by something that is cheaper. This is for the betterment of all, at the expense of the said factory worker. This is called reality and those who choose to prevent efficiency is only retarding progress. Now, of course, the said factory worker isn't obsolete - they should "skill up" and do something that currently isn't achievable via low paid labour, or machines. This is where value is derived, and should be encouraged (ala, re-education).
    - itmag 15y ago
      Personally, I think increasing productivity is a huge reason to implement some kind of Guaranteed Minimum Income. This guy puts it better than me: http://www.xamuel.com/ten-reasons-for-guaranteed-minimum-income/ http://www.xamuel.com/ten-reasons-for-guaranteed-minimum-inc... Also, I think it's a bit cruel to expect former factory workers to just "skill up" and become programming ninjas or whatever. Not everyone is born with the same cognitive assets.
      - Gormo 15y ago
        That idea sounds pretty far-fetched. 3D-printing is another step closer to the ideal of self-sufficiency; similar improvements in agriculture and energy production all put us on the path toward resuming a kind of modern homesteading, allowing us to eliminate the role of institutional middlemen in meeting our basic needs. Apart from the dubious economics of a Guaranteed Minimum Income, such a program would maintain the role of institutional intermediaries in our lives just as self-sufficiency again becomes possible.
bitwize 15y ago
3D printing is not the future. Chucking a solid block of metal into a 5-axis CNC mill and having it grind out an arbitrary shape from a CAD drawing is the future. I don't see any way of getting parts made out of the requisite materials with the requisite strength and resolution with "3D printing" technology. It's great for novelties, like the service which takes your WoW data and prints up a statuette of your character. But for serious fabrication, good old machining is still the best bet, coupled with high technology and cheap garage models with advanced safety protocols that let hobbyists grind out small to medium sized parts at small scales. As a bonus you can recycle the shavings.
- pilgrim689 15y ago
  Recycling the shavings isn't a bonus, as there are no shavings to recycle in additive manufacturing! I'd like to see a rebuttal to your argument though, why is 3-d printing better than a "5-axis CNC mill"?
  - pacala 15y ago
    A number of dimensions for a comparison: * How complex an object each technology can produce. Both technologies have various limitations in the shape of the objects that can be produced. 5-axis CNC is limited by the need to find an angle for the arm to hit the shaving point and by the size of the shaving head. 3d-printing is limited by the need to additively deposit on top of existing layers. * How expensive is the manufacturing equipment. Accurately aiming a high speed, high torque spinning arm in 5d is not particularly simple mechanically and it's likely to require expensive calibration. 3d-printing is much simpler mechanically and easier to calibrate. * How fast the production process is. Neither process is particularly fast, both are far behind injection molding. * Strength and strength/weight. 3d-printing has a possible edge for strength/weight because it can print hollow objects.
    - forgottenpaswrd 15y ago
      "3d-printing is limited by the need to additively deposit on top of existing layers." Not really, you can use another material as support, then dissolve it. "How fast the production process is. Neither process is particularly fast, both are far behind injection molding." Well, if you consider that injection molding usually require WEEKS or MONTHS to get the first matrix mold done, then 3d printing is super fast.
URSpider94 15y ago
I agree that fab-on-demand technologies will become important in the future, but I don't buy the vision of a 3D printer (at least, not a good one) in every home. Think about the 2D printing analogy -- while almost everyone has a 2D printer in their home, early every morning, while we're still asleep, a car drives by our house and hurls a poorly printed bundle of paper at our front stoop containing the day's news. There's no reason that we COULDN'T each print a personalized copy of the day's newspaper at home, but the fact is that we don't. Likewise, I'll bet that most of HN have given up on printing their own photos at home, and just do the sensible thing and upload them to Shutterfly, or Target, or WalMart, or any of the other sites that can deliver high-quality photo prints to your door for pennies. I just don't believe that the average user will take on the technical knowledge, space, upkeep and supply costs to run a 3D printer in their house. But, I can see the day when every Kinko's, or the equivalent, is equipped with one of these babies.
- jessriedel 15y ago
  These scenarios aren't mutual exclusive. Just like most homes have newspaper delivery and a printer, it's easy to imagine most homes having a 3D printer for certain products and to have other products printed out at dedicated facilities.
- bpm140 15y ago
  In 1975, if you wanted a personal computer you bought a kit for roughly $1,750 in today's dollars and you assembled it yourself. It didn't have a monitor. You programmed it yourself. And at the end of all that you had blinky lights that could do math. Five years later you have the Apple][, the Atari ST and the IBM PC. Ten years later you had a Macintosh. Thirty-five years later we were walking around with supercomputers in our pocket. Extrapolating the adoption of 3D printing based upon today's home kits is definitely short-term thinking. Better to consider what a $500,000 top-of-the-line Objet printer can do and imagine it in you home 15 years from now, in the space your microwave takes up.
  - DerekL 15y ago
    You mean the Atari 8-bit computers; the Atari 400 and 800 were released in 1979. The Atari ST didn't debut until 1985.

33 points by robdoherty2 15y ago

From the title I'd expected an article making the argument that 3-D printing was unlike virtual reality, or an explanation of how it came to be unlike VR. OK, now I see that there was an inline link http://www.technologyreview.com/blog/mimssbits/27526/ http://www.technologyreview.com/blog/mimssbits/27526/ to an article called "Why 3-D Printing Will Go the Way of Virtual Reality". This article's only mention of VR is the claim that "3-D printing, like VR before it, is one of those technologies that suggest a trend of long and steep adoption driven by rapid advances on the systems we have now." Which is not really about VR at all, only saying that VR is an example of a technology which was not adopted at the rate at which its promise would imply. So reading between the lines, collectively these authors would seem to imply that 3-D printing, whatever its merits and limitations, as a technology must have almost nothing to do with virtual reality. Otherwise, these authors surely would have mentioned it. Interesting how the term "virtual reality" predates the term "linkbait" by many years.

Maciek416 15y ago
Agreed, the almost non sequitur mention of VR feels like a straw man. The authors seem to sort of dismiss VR as a fad that disappeared with the headsets and Powergloves. Meanwhile, every year, we're seeing a steady march upwards in GPU power, mass-market uptake of 3D immersive gaming, and devices like the Wii or Kinect selling like crazy in numbers that would have been unthinkable in Jaron Lanier's heyday. VR, or aspects of its original "dream", are steadily making inroads into daily life. If anything, 3D printing will be exactly like VR in the sense that it will have an initial burst of excitement in the mass media, followed by a long steady march toward ubiquitous, banal, take-for-grantedness.

fraserharris 15y ago

This is profound: "Something interesting happens when the cost of tooling-up falls. There comes a point where your production runs are small enough that the economies of scale that justify container ships from China stop working. There comes a point where making new things isn't a capital investment but simply a marginal one." The West can return to manufacturing if it becomes a function of the creative class. This could be a major trend for the next decade.

marshray 15y ago
It is a very interesting possibility. My concern is that if this technology truly is revolutionary but does not carve out a sufficiently large piece of the pie for the traditional parasites (e.g., distribution moguls and IP lawyers) it could very easily be outlawed. (Probably not effectively, but note the number of people who are in jail today for replicating a plant.) This will be hard since 3D printing potentially increases wealth with much less involvement of money. So how will they take their slice of pie? If it really is a disruptive technology, there will be plenty of cases where the economic advantages eliminate someone's job. I'm old enough to remember discussion about US factory workers being replaced by robots. Factory automation turned out to be far from the main threat to US factory workers' jobs.
- chii 15y ago
  "main threat to US factory workers' jobs." There is no such thing as threat - a factory worker who cannot compete MUST be selected out, and replaced by something that is cheaper. This is for the betterment of all, at the expense of the said factory worker. This is called reality and those who choose to prevent efficiency is only retarding progress. Now, of course, the said factory worker isn't obsolete - they should "skill up" and do something that currently isn't achievable via low paid labour, or machines. This is where value is derived, and should be encouraged (ala, re-education).
  - itmag 15y ago
    Personally, I think increasing productivity is a huge reason to implement some kind of Guaranteed Minimum Income. This guy puts it better than me: http://www.xamuel.com/ten-reasons-for-guaranteed-minimum-income/ http://www.xamuel.com/ten-reasons-for-guaranteed-minimum-inc... Also, I think it's a bit cruel to expect former factory workers to just "skill up" and become programming ninjas or whatever. Not everyone is born with the same cognitive assets.
    - Gormo 15y ago
      That idea sounds pretty far-fetched. 3D-printing is another step closer to the ideal of self-sufficiency; similar improvements in agriculture and energy production all put us on the path toward resuming a kind of modern homesteading, allowing us to eliminate the role of institutional middlemen in meeting our basic needs. Apart from the dubious economics of a Guaranteed Minimum Income, such a program would maintain the role of institutional intermediaries in our lives just as self-sufficiency again becomes possible.

bitwize 15y ago

3D printing is not the future. Chucking a solid block of metal into a 5-axis CNC mill and having it grind out an arbitrary shape from a CAD drawing is the future. I don't see any way of getting parts made out of the requisite materials with the requisite strength and resolution with "3D printing" technology. It's great for novelties, like the service which takes your WoW data and prints up a statuette of your character. But for serious fabrication, good old machining is still the best bet, coupled with high technology and cheap garage models with advanced safety protocols that let hobbyists grind out small to medium sized parts at small scales. As a bonus you can recycle the shavings.

pilgrim689 15y ago
Recycling the shavings isn't a bonus, as there are no shavings to recycle in additive manufacturing! I'd like to see a rebuttal to your argument though, why is 3-d printing better than a "5-axis CNC mill"?
- pacala 15y ago
  A number of dimensions for a comparison: * How complex an object each technology can produce. Both technologies have various limitations in the shape of the objects that can be produced. 5-axis CNC is limited by the need to find an angle for the arm to hit the shaving point and by the size of the shaving head. 3d-printing is limited by the need to additively deposit on top of existing layers. * How expensive is the manufacturing equipment. Accurately aiming a high speed, high torque spinning arm in 5d is not particularly simple mechanically and it's likely to require expensive calibration. 3d-printing is much simpler mechanically and easier to calibrate. * How fast the production process is. Neither process is particularly fast, both are far behind injection molding. * Strength and strength/weight. 3d-printing has a possible edge for strength/weight because it can print hollow objects.
  - forgottenpaswrd 15y ago
    "3d-printing is limited by the need to additively deposit on top of existing layers." Not really, you can use another material as support, then dissolve it. "How fast the production process is. Neither process is particularly fast, both are far behind injection molding." Well, if you consider that injection molding usually require WEEKS or MONTHS to get the first matrix mold done, then 3d printing is super fast.

URSpider94 15y ago

I agree that fab-on-demand technologies will become important in the future, but I don't buy the vision of a 3D printer (at least, not a good one) in every home. Think about the 2D printing analogy -- while almost everyone has a 2D printer in their home, early every morning, while we're still asleep, a car drives by our house and hurls a poorly printed bundle of paper at our front stoop containing the day's news. There's no reason that we COULDN'T each print a personalized copy of the day's newspaper at home, but the fact is that we don't. Likewise, I'll bet that most of HN have given up on printing their own photos at home, and just do the sensible thing and upload them to Shutterfly, or Target, or WalMart, or any of the other sites that can deliver high-quality photo prints to your door for pennies. I just don't believe that the average user will take on the technical knowledge, space, upkeep and supply costs to run a 3D printer in their house. But, I can see the day when every Kinko's, or the equivalent, is equipped with one of these babies.

jessriedel 15y ago
These scenarios aren't mutual exclusive. Just like most homes have newspaper delivery and a printer, it's easy to imagine most homes having a 3D printer for certain products and to have other products printed out at dedicated facilities.
bpm140 15y ago
In 1975, if you wanted a personal computer you bought a kit for roughly $1,750 in today's dollars and you assembled it yourself. It didn't have a monitor. You programmed it yourself. And at the end of all that you had blinky lights that could do math. Five years later you have the Apple][, the Atari ST and the IBM PC. Ten years later you had a Macintosh. Thirty-five years later we were walking around with supercomputers in our pocket. Extrapolating the adoption of 3D printing based upon today's home kits is definitely short-term thinking. Better to consider what a $500,000 top-of-the-line Objet printer can do and imagine it in you home 15 years from now, in the space your microwave takes up.
- DerekL 15y ago
  You mean the Atari 8-bit computers; the Atari 400 and 800 were released in 1979. The Atari ST didn't debut until 1985.