4 ms·

I want to buy a printer but I want it to simply print what I tell it to (which indeed is exactly how it should behave). What can I do?

nitwit005 2y ago
Good luck with your currency counterfeiting.
- MostlyStable 2y ago
  I'm curious how long it has been since an even half-way convincing fake could be printed on a home printer (even if it were totally unlocked). My guess is quite a while. Maybe you could do it for small denominations that don't have color shifting inks, but I'm pretty sure that paper that even sort of approximates the feel would make it not economically viable, even on a home printer.
  - nitwit005 2y ago
    The reason most of it gets detected is that it doesn't succeed at being half convincing.
    - MostlyStable 2y ago
      Yeah, that was my point: these rules aren't really preventing counterfeiting, because even if you were allowed to print currency on a home printer, it wouldn't work, because it would be trivially obvious as fakes. It sounds like you are saying that making trivially obvious counterfeit bills is still possible, which seems like it even further supports the fact that these rules aren't very useful.
    - sophacles 2y ago
      There's only like ~55 billion us banknotes in circulation (according to uscurency.gov). It wouldn't surprise me to find out that banks' counting machines scan each of them, and put the serial number and location into a database, and that database flags bad serial numbers and things like "this serial number is also claimed to be in a vault 1000 miles away" - causing the bill to be flagged, set aside, and turned over to the secret service. The working set of data needed for this type of thing could probably be stored in a couple TB - small enough to be in a single (beefy) server's RAM.
      - Sohcahtoa82 2y ago
        Such a database could be sharded out insanely easily, too. Rather than having 1 BEEFY server with a couple TB of RAM, you could do a couple dozen servers with a more modest 256 GB, with each server having a strictly defined subset of serial numbers (ie, one server could handle notes with serial numbers ending in 00 or 01, another handling 02/03, etc.), and the load balancing becomes extremely simple.
- marcodiego 2y ago
  If, in our current world, the only reason you see for privacy is to commit a crime, then the shame is on you.
  - nitwit005 2y ago
    In our current world, I don't see a reason to own a printer. If there is someone sending out printed communications that needs that level of security, and wasn't committing a crime, I'd love to hear about it. Because it'd seem like they'd have to completely avoid the mail system, leaving fingerprints, or licking the envelope.
  - deleted 2y ago
    [deleted]
wayvey 2y ago
I wonder if a pen plotter could replace a BW printer, probably adequate only for certain types of documents.
leshenka 2y ago
We got open source 3d printers you can build at home __before__ open source regular printers that you can build at home How come?
- ndileas 2y ago
  2-d printing is a hard, boring problem and many people increasingly print very little, especially hackers.
- bragr 2y ago
  While most of the printer is pretty simple mechanically and electronically, inkjet heads and laser drums are going to be beyond the ability of most home hobbyists. Even dot matrix heads would be pretty complicated to fabricate with lots of tiny precise parts.
  - craftkiller 2y ago
    I don't think this is the reason because someone could harvest the heads from an existing printer and make everything else open source.
- pavel_lishin 2y ago
  It genuinely seems that a 3D printer is easier to build; the precision and resolution required is significantly less than for photo-quality (or even document-quality) printing, right?
  - MostlyStable 2y ago
    Previous discussions on hackernews (see this comment [0]) claim that the paper handling hardware is part of the problem. It's apparently quite difficult to do reliably (thus all the 90s jokes about paper jams) and all the known solutions are locked up under patent [0] https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=37007815 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=37007815
    - pavel_lishin 2y ago
iancmceachern 2y ago
Buy Fuji Dimatix print heads and build your own.
bityard 2y ago
Monochrome laser printers don't have tracking dots. (* That I have seen evidence of.)
deleted 2y ago
[deleted]

nitwit005 2y ago

Good luck with your currency counterfeiting.

MostlyStable 2y ago
I'm curious how long it has been since an even half-way convincing fake could be printed on a home printer (even if it were totally unlocked). My guess is quite a while. Maybe you could do it for small denominations that don't have color shifting inks, but I'm pretty sure that paper that even sort of approximates the feel would make it not economically viable, even on a home printer.
- nitwit005 2y ago
  The reason most of it gets detected is that it doesn't succeed at being half convincing.
  - MostlyStable 2y ago
    Yeah, that was my point: these rules aren't really preventing counterfeiting, because even if you were allowed to print currency on a home printer, it wouldn't work, because it would be trivially obvious as fakes. It sounds like you are saying that making trivially obvious counterfeit bills is still possible, which seems like it even further supports the fact that these rules aren't very useful.
  - sophacles 2y ago
    There's only like ~55 billion us banknotes in circulation (according to uscurency.gov). It wouldn't surprise me to find out that banks' counting machines scan each of them, and put the serial number and location into a database, and that database flags bad serial numbers and things like "this serial number is also claimed to be in a vault 1000 miles away" - causing the bill to be flagged, set aside, and turned over to the secret service. The working set of data needed for this type of thing could probably be stored in a couple TB - small enough to be in a single (beefy) server's RAM.
    - Sohcahtoa82 2y ago
      Such a database could be sharded out insanely easily, too. Rather than having 1 BEEFY server with a couple TB of RAM, you could do a couple dozen servers with a more modest 256 GB, with each server having a strictly defined subset of serial numbers (ie, one server could handle notes with serial numbers ending in 00 or 01, another handling 02/03, etc.), and the load balancing becomes extremely simple.
marcodiego 2y ago
If, in our current world, the only reason you see for privacy is to commit a crime, then the shame is on you.
- nitwit005 2y ago
  In our current world, I don't see a reason to own a printer. If there is someone sending out printed communications that needs that level of security, and wasn't committing a crime, I'd love to hear about it. Because it'd seem like they'd have to completely avoid the mail system, leaving fingerprints, or licking the envelope.
- deleted 2y ago
  [deleted]

wayvey 2y ago

I wonder if a pen plotter could replace a BW printer, probably adequate only for certain types of documents.

leshenka 2y ago

We got open source 3d printers you can build at home __before__ open source regular printers that you can build at home How come?

ndileas 2y ago
2-d printing is a hard, boring problem and many people increasingly print very little, especially hackers.
bragr 2y ago
While most of the printer is pretty simple mechanically and electronically, inkjet heads and laser drums are going to be beyond the ability of most home hobbyists. Even dot matrix heads would be pretty complicated to fabricate with lots of tiny precise parts.
- craftkiller 2y ago
  I don't think this is the reason because someone could harvest the heads from an existing printer and make everything else open source.
pavel_lishin 2y ago
It genuinely seems that a 3D printer is easier to build; the precision and resolution required is significantly less than for photo-quality (or even document-quality) printing, right?
- MostlyStable 2y ago
  Previous discussions on hackernews (see this comment [0]) claim that the paper handling hardware is part of the problem. It's apparently quite difficult to do reliably (thus all the 90s jokes about paper jams) and all the known solutions are locked up under patent [0] https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=37007815 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=37007815
  - pavel_lishin 2y ago

iancmceachern 2y ago

Buy Fuji Dimatix print heads and build your own.

bityard 2y ago

Monochrome laser printers don't have tracking dots. (* That I have seen evidence of.)

deleted 2y ago

[deleted]