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TL;DR: If you care about open source hardware development, share early and share frequently so that we can establish a public record of prior art, should this come up again. I"m the owner of OpenBeamUSA and the author of the blog post. Yes, you are correct, a provisional patent was filed a year prior to the Oct 29th, 2013 filing date that is on file with the USPTO. However, (and please correct me if I am wrong on this - I am not a patent lawyer) it is my understanding that for the claims to be valid to the Oct 2012 date, they have to be present in the 2012 patent. Companies patenting things normally file a "junk" patent to hold their place in line, where they make one or two very basic claim about their products. Then in the course of the year, they pile in the rest of the claims and flesh it out. Only the claims that are supported by the 2012 provisional patent filing dates can be backdated to the 2012 priority date. In other words, if I claimed that I invented a computer controlled hot glue gun (my newbie friendly explanation of what a 3D Printer is) on Oct 2012 but added in Oct 2013 that my claim involves putting a switch on the glue gun head, the 2013 date is what the patent examiner would go by when examining prior art. Without being able to see what was filed in Oct 2012, it is not 100% clear whether Mr. Graber's video constitutes as prior art. My guess though, is that Makerbot did not actually have everything fleshed out in October of 2012. Given that in March of 2013, they are still relying on their community for improvement ideas: http://www.makerbot.com/blog/2... - which is now subjected to scrutiny due to another one of their patents: http://www.freepatentsonline.c... (The alternative explanation is that they actually did have their stuff together to file patents on the new extruder design, but intentionally shipped a substandard product leaving the community to fix it. Neither scenario paints them in a good light.) This one is going to be interesting to watch. While the US moved from first to invent to first to file during the time this patent was in provisional patent status, prior art invalidates both first to invent and first to file. The real question is can they find a way around all this prior art claim, when one of Makerbot's founder (Zack) was an active contributor to the reprap project. My guess is that the IP is sufficiently tainted that it would be very hard to find a path forward that has no prior art. While the legitimacy of the prior art I've sited is being questioned, my real objectives are: A) To encourage other Open Source Hardware developers to keep sharing, early and often to establish prior art in a public way, and B) Raise awareness that Makerbot is trying to patent ideas that originated from within the Reprap community, and to show how we can work within the USPTO's system to challenge said patents. This way people who are more knowledgeable than I can step forward and fight this. And given that there's a bunch of people now posting various examples of automated bed levelling dating back to 2008, I've seemed to have done my job to get the ball rolling. -=- Terence

And here they are, attempting to patent said extruder drive design: http://www.freepatentsonline.c...

They're taking things from the open source RepRap community and attempting to patent them. Do not support MakerBot. Do not buy their machines. And advise everyone you know not to purchase their machines should they be considering it.

The lackluster jobs reports have almost nothing to do with automation and worker replacement. Big companies don't hire in the mass needed to move the unemployment stats much more than a few tenths of percent. This is because they already have hired people. They've been hiring people for years as the grow. At some point you can decide to get a little more out of the people you hire by pushing them a bit, or maybe making their jobs a little more productive. But either way, the last thing a modern business wants to do is hire a bunch of people they'll have to layoff down the road.

Small business is where the growth in employment happens. Small business expansion is at an all-time low, and has been since the rise of stupid laws like Sarbanes/Oxley, that can devastate a small company while just adding to the accounting burden of big companies (who can absorb it or pass it along to their customers). Until the US becomes small-business friendly again, there's not going to be much job growth.

And what about all that automation? The whole point is that robots are getting cheap. That means it's going to be possible for small businesses and entrepreneurs are going to be able to buy them. What will they do with them? How about custom manufacturing everything? If you've ever remodeled a kitchen, you know that there's a lot of activity around building cabinets, designing the space, picking materials, etc. It's one of those things that produces a lot of activity and is expensive, but not so far out of reach that average people can't afford it. Now think about the automotive aftermarket, custom motorcycles, even additions to homes. All of these things are somewhat custom today. Imagine if those same ideas were applied to cell phones, where a designer could build a model of a phone just for you, have the circuit board made, 3Dprint the case in any color(s) you want, Assemble the phone in the back room and finally, gets you a detailed breakdown of the cost, which is surprisingly not much more than today's iPhone 5S.

Oh, and when you drop it, can easily fit a new glass cover on it because he knew you were going to do that.

WTF is "locked in"? Or what is a "locked in printer" in general for that matter? I have one, I use it nearly every day, and if there is anything "locked in" Im completely missing it. I do use 123D Design for modeling, but also Sketchup and Solidworks and Ive tried others and they happily interoperate. I get PLA from China, aftermarket parts from eBay, and Makerbot even supports that. Their website even promotes open source 3d modeling software.

Someone seems to have already slapped a 'TM' on that...

3D printers haven't costs "tens of thousands of dollars" for quite some time: http://store.makerbot.com/3d-printers.html And they aren't hard to use, especially if you're printing someone else's downloaded design.

You're missing the fact the person wanting the gun doesn't need to be the one with the printer. Some gang land arms dealer, who currently sells stolen ("untracable") guns, will be printing untracable guns on demand out of the the trunk of a Pontiac.

Considering the already cheap price of 3D printers and the fact they can print copies of themselves, you're never going to dent criminal use of 3D printing. You're not unringing that bell.

Anyone who can afford a 3D printer can easily buy a gun.

But can they buy a dozen guns? Or a hundred?
You are conflating the tool that makes the gun with the gun itself.

3D Printers are under 1000, and http://store.makerbot.com/replicator2.html>decent ones are approaching $2000.
Mark my words, Soon the media will require licenses to buy, tagging, and federal monitoring of sales. And not just because of guns.

Is AC really trolling?

As you can see in this photo:
http://usabledevices.com/wp-content/uploads/2012/11/Maker-carnival-Shanghai-displays.jpg

They're selling a copy of the MakerBot Replicator:
http://store.makerbot.com/replicator-404.html

I don't follow this scene too closely - I didn't have room at the old house to build a 3-d printer. But it's still on the agenda for the not too distant future. If you actually care about the ideas of Open Source (hardware, firmware or software), then you need to examine this question extremely carefully. There is a lot of sound and fury ; how much that signifies, I'm not sure. I was considering buying one of Caveat emptor, very much indeed.

Links : 1, 2, 3 (with a lot of comments!)

I don't follow this scene too closely - I didn't have room at the old house to build a 3-d printer. But it's still on the agenda for the not too distant future. If you actually care about the ideas of Open Source (hardware, firmware or software), then you need to examine this question extremely carefully. There is a lot of sound and fury ; how much that signifies, I'm not sure. I was considering buying one of Caveat emptor, very much indeed.

Links : 1, 2, 3 (with a lot of comments!)

Check out RepRap and MakerBot

Woah, $1500 for a Buildatron KIT. You can get a Techzone Mendel kit for $800. As far as I know, Makerbot is easier to build, but its price is $1099. For $1500, it should either be pre-assembled or they ship you an intern for a day to assist.

Yep. Makerbot also sell their Replicator for around $200. I think this is a 2 colour version (dual print heads) and $48 for the spools.
http://www.makerbot.com/
Interesting stuff to make too!
http://www.thingiverse.com/thing:13101
More pics:
http://www.pcauthority.com.au/Gallery/288483,in-pictures-why-the-makerbot-replicator-is-one-of-the-best-toys-ever.aspx/1
from CES

You mean like this one? http://store.makerbot.com/thing-o-matic-kit-mk7.html

As maker-bot technology gets more sophisticated, can create more complex objects (even foodstuffs) and cheapens, it lends itself to mass production. I'm going to be very interested to see if China's manufacturing sector stands up to this over the next 20 years or so.

http://www.makerbot.com/

Under $2000 to get going.

$2000 is a lot of money to make plastic toys as a hobby.

http://www.makerbot.com/

Under $2000 to get going.

This is timely - I'm just starting an effort to get a makerbot in our local middle school. Get out there and support engineering in your school!

Managed to not tell me anything I'd like to know, availability, how big is it, how much does it cost, what materials and so on. Just hype.

This newly fangled Interweb thing has curious devices called 'links'. These are often represented by words distinctively coloured or otherwise marked. Your computational engine is most likely provided with a small carriage vulgarly known as a 'mouse'. If you trundle this carriage across the surface of your writing desk, a representation of a hand or arrow or similar pointing device is automatically and synchronously moved across your information display. If you manoeuvre your 'mouse' until this pointer appears to hover over the distinctively marked text, and then press down on the depressable are on the front left of the carriage until a light click is heard, a page of information will appear elucidating the point being made.

Just sayin'

The original V1 Thing-o-Matic costs around $1,100, but I'm guessing V2 will be more expensive than that, among other reasons, because of the dual-extruder.
Actually, forget the guess, here are some links: http://store.makerbot.com/thing-o-matic-kit-mk7.html
http://store.makerbot.com/makerbot-pva-1kg-spool.html
http://store.makerbot.com/replicator-404.html
If that is just too much, I would recomend finding a local area maker space (as many of them have these, and cost of joining is similar to that of a gym. Here is the one in Michigan I belong to:
Maker-Works

The original V1 Thing-o-Matic costs around $1,100, but I'm guessing V2 will be more expensive than that, among other reasons, because of the dual-extruder.
Actually, forget the guess, here are some links: http://store.makerbot.com/thing-o-matic-kit-mk7.html
http://store.makerbot.com/makerbot-pva-1kg-spool.html
http://store.makerbot.com/replicator-404.html
If that is just too much, I would recomend finding a local area maker space (as many of them have these, and cost of joining is similar to that of a gym. Here is the one in Michigan I belong to:
Maker-Works

The original V1 Thing-o-Matic costs around $1,100, but I'm guessing V2 will be more expensive than that, among other reasons, because of the dual-extruder.
Actually, forget the guess, here are some links: http://store.makerbot.com/thing-o-matic-kit-mk7.html
http://store.makerbot.com/makerbot-pva-1kg-spool.html
http://store.makerbot.com/replicator-404.html
If that is just too much, I would recomend finding a local area maker space (as many of them have these, and cost of joining is similar to that of a gym. Here is the one in Michigan I belong to:
Maker-Works

In the makerbot store there are ABS, PLA, and water soluble PVA filament spools.
I assume ABS is the plastic we are used to seeing everywhere that is fairly durable and water proof and that the water soluble PVA is the corn product he talked about in the video.

Read TFL. It's available now, it costs $1,749.00, and the feedstock costs about fifty dollars a spool.

Under 2k? DONE! (It will need assembly for that price)
https://shop.ultimaker.com/
http://store.makerbot.com/

FYI: I got an ultimaker, my first print was done after 8 hours of receiving the kit. However, fast is relative, http://daid2.mine.nu/~daid/IMG_20110929_235158.small.jpeg this print took 3 hours (I was printing on slow speed, normally printing at double that speed, and experimenting with 4x speed)

Are Gothic Cathedrals ugly? How about golden chalices?

> I don't think we have the technology to print crap yet. I'm sure someone is working on it though.

Your wish is their command -- http://www.makerbot.com/ :-)

I recall hearing about a chocolate extruder for http://store.makerbot.com/ Thing-O-Matic

So... they made a Frostruder... which you can buy here: http://store.makerbot.com/toolheads/makerbot-frostruder.html

Bill

It may not be as small, but just about -- and a kit is $1299US, cheaper than $1707US ($1200EU), but some assembly is required, and it doesn't harden a bath of patented chemical liquid with LEDs -- Makerbot builds things using a plastruder (high res hot glue gun) and a spool of "lego" plastic.

Still waiting for the "revolution".... I feel that it's just around the corner.

They exist, they just don't make chips yet, but that is being worked on. http://www.fabathome.org/ http://www.makerbot.com/ http://www.thingiverse.com/

Completely true. There's still tons of things that can be repaired these days: I've replaced the display in my Palm Treo smartphone, and the touchscreen overlay in my Nintendo DS. I've re-soldered headphone jacks (and then coated in glue to prevent it from breaking again). I've taken my PC video card apart and put a new fan and heatsinks on it.

And as for making things from scratch, that too is actually becoming easier. You design with free software and have a PCB manufactured in single quantities for $2.50 a square inch (batchpcb laen pcb). There are services that will produce plastic parts from uploaded 3D models for a fee (shapeways ponoko), or you can put together one of the many rising 3D printer kits and create your own parts out of plastic (makerbot bfb ultimaker).

I still thought it was kind of neat, and I wanted to use it with my Thing-o-Matic, and at $0.99 I'd happily buy it. But then I start reading the description of the last update: STL and point cloud export available with an in-app purchase. In app purchase cost? $5.

I'm not interested enough to pay $6. I really dislike in-app purchases that are so much more than the app was. If the app included the functionality and cost $3, I'd happily buy it. The app has to generate the same set of triangles whether it's just displaying it on the screen or it's going to be output to STL or a point cloud. I'm sure there is a little more work involved, but I have a hard time believing the export function took 5x the work of the initial version.

The wiki is still up, and more informative than the store site. Wiki - MakerBot Industries

yea but you could do that for a at least a year now,this is just a new revision

and there is no mention of where to get this prized kit, its literally a collection of photos of someone putting it together

http://store.makerbot.com/

It's a reference to the MakerBot. It's a RepStrap, a way to build yourself a RepRap if you don't yet own a one. I've got one on my desk upstairs, waiting for a replacement thermistor for my extruder so I can start churning out parts for this one.

The fact that you can get one in a kit form has spawned a whole host of different printable upgrades for the MakerBot. For example, there's a set of models up on thingiverse you can download and print that will let you mount a Dremel tool in place of the print head for light CNC work. I'm planning to try cutting circuit boards with it.

I have to agree with your sentiment. And "Nature Deficit" disorder is part of it, but that does not explain why most kids may not understand what a bootloader is on a computer or whatever if they are indoors a lot around computers. I guess I was lucky to just come in at the edge of things (my first computer was a 6502-based KIM-I, and my first languages were Assembler, Commodore BASIC, and Forth). Still, anyone can run a Virtual Machine on their PC and watch what happens with a simulated computer booting up.

Maybe this is related? :-) From:
"Ignorance, Apathy, and Greed"
http://www.progress.org/fold21.htm
"The causes of social problems exist on many levels. When we ask why social problems such as poverty, unemployment, crime, and war exist, each time we determine a cause, we can ask "why" again, as children often do until they are hushed. Poverty exists because some folks can't find jobs or the jobs pay poorly. But then why is the wage level so low? Because of the tax and land-tenure systems. Why do we have those systems? Because special interests pay to legislate it. Why do special interests get away with it? The voting structure lets them. Why does that structure exist? The voters don't demand to change it. Why not? When we dig down through all the layers to the roots of the causes, we find three fundamental causes of social problems: ignorance, apathy, and greed. The ultimate remedy for social problems therefore must confront all three root causes. It does little good to just run down the street shouting "share the rent!" or "stop war!". Uttering a slogan does no good unless it arouses sympathy."

Here is something related I posted on how my perspective may be different because my mother lived through the German bombing and invasion of Rotterdam and subsequent intentional starvation:
http://slashdot.org/comments.pl?sid=1755090&cid=33264228

Still, there are exceptions with some younger people, like the "open manufacturing" community I am involved in.
http://www.openmanufacturing.net/
Which includes indirectly the RepRap, MakerBot, Maker, etc. scenes:
http://www.makerbot.com/
http://www.makerbot.com/
http://makezine.com/
http://100kgarages.com/

While small, that's an encouraging trend towards DIY and an encouraging hopeful scene.

At the other end of trends, you may find some other links through your local historical societies. I've found that mine is a place where there are people who are interested in how things work (or worked) in various ways (mostly older women in that crowd, but some older men who know a lot about machinery and industry). These are people who know all this sort of stuff:
http://www.lindsaybks.com/dgjp/index.html
My father was a Merchant Mariner for twenty-something years, then a machinist and tool-maker, so I've learned some stuff from watching him.

While I agree with your parallels on the rest of the points, on basic income, while you make a good point, in general, it means something a little different (essentially, it means social security for everyone young or old as a substantial check from the government every month acknowledging their right as a citizen to the fruits of some of the industrial commons, as a formal government program to deal with rich/poor divides, the concentration of wealth, the lack of jobs, etc. in a systematic way still within a capitalist framework).
http://www.usbig.net/whatisbig.html

I have to agree with your sentiment. And "Nature Deficit" disorder is part of it, but that does not explain why most kids may not understand what a bootloader is on a computer or whatever if they are indoors a lot around computers. I guess I was lucky to just come in at the edge of things (my first computer was a 6502-based KIM-I, and my first languages were Assembler, Commodore BASIC, and Forth). Still, anyone can run a Virtual Machine on their PC and watch what happens with a simulated computer booting up.

Maybe this is related? :-) From:
"Ignorance, Apathy, and Greed"
http://www.progress.org/fold21.htm
"The causes of social problems exist on many levels. When we ask why social problems such as poverty, unemployment, crime, and war exist, each time we determine a cause, we can ask "why" again, as children often do until they are hushed. Poverty exists because some folks can't find jobs or the jobs pay poorly. But then why is the wage level so low? Because of the tax and land-tenure systems. Why do we have those systems? Because special interests pay to legislate it. Why do special interests get away with it? The voting structure lets them. Why does that structure exist? The voters don't demand to change it. Why not? When we dig down through all the layers to the roots of the causes, we find three fundamental causes of social problems: ignorance, apathy, and greed. The ultimate remedy for social problems therefore must confront all three root causes. It does little good to just run down the street shouting "share the rent!" or "stop war!". Uttering a slogan does no good unless it arouses sympathy."

Here is something related I posted on how my perspective may be different because my mother lived through the German bombing and invasion of Rotterdam and subsequent intentional starvation:
http://slashdot.org/comments.pl?sid=1755090&cid=33264228

Still, there are exceptions with some younger people, like the "open manufacturing" community I am involved in.
http://www.openmanufacturing.net/
Which includes indirectly the RepRap, MakerBot, Maker, etc. scenes:
http://www.makerbot.com/
http://www.makerbot.com/
http://makezine.com/
http://100kgarages.com/

While small, that's an encouraging trend towards DIY and an encouraging hopeful scene.

At the other end of trends, you may find some other links through your local historical societies. I've found that mine is a place where there are people who are interested in how things work (or worked) in various ways (mostly older women in that crowd, but some older men who know a lot about machinery and industry). These are people who know all this sort of stuff:
http://www.lindsaybks.com/dgjp/index.html
My father was a Merchant Mariner for twenty-something years, then a machinist and tool-maker, so I've learned some stuff from watching him.

While I agree with your parallels on the rest of the points, on basic income, while you make a good point, in general, it means something a little different (essentially, it means social security for everyone young or old as a substantial check from the government every month acknowledging their right as a citizen to the fruits of some of the industrial commons, as a formal government program to deal with rich/poor divides, the concentration of wealth, the lack of jobs, etc. in a systematic way still within a capitalist framework).
http://www.usbig.net/whatisbig.html

I like http://wiki.makerbot.com/start better, it's a much more solid and well thought out printer, granted it can't make as many of it's own parts as RepRap can.

They're working on that.

I tried to submit a story about this but it was rejected...

2obvious4u writes "Here on Slashdot we like to discuss copyright, MPAA, RIAA, torrents and all the little details that go along with false scarcity and what that means to the digital economy. Well what happens when that false scarcity starts happening to physical goods? I bring this up for discussion because I've spent the last couple of days looking at getting a MakerBot CNC 3D printer and while looking at it I found the RepRap 3D printer which is almost fully self replicating. You can then go to thingverse and download real world, usable, physical objects including the RepRap 3D printer. So now just like with music and movies we can share physical objects with each other and all we need to print it is the digital design and enough plastic or other materials to create the object. If you haven't seen this tech and how much it has grown in the last two years, you are really missing out. These things even decorate cupcakes!"

Basically we are at the point where we can take a raw material input stream and print whatever objects we want. The next step would be to be able to make things out of exotic materials.

I tried to submit a story about this but it was rejected...

2obvious4u writes "Here on Slashdot we like to discuss copyright, MPAA, RIAA, torrents and all the little details that go along with false scarcity and what that means to the digital economy. Well what happens when that false scarcity starts happening to physical goods? I bring this up for discussion because I've spent the last couple of days looking at getting a MakerBot CNC 3D printer and while looking at it I found the RepRap 3D printer which is almost fully self replicating. You can then go to thingverse and download real world, usable, physical objects including the RepRap 3D printer. So now just like with music and movies we can share physical objects with each other and all we need to print it is the digital design and enough plastic or other materials to create the object. If you haven't seen this tech and how much it has grown in the last two years, you are really missing out. These things even decorate cupcakes!"

Basically we are at the point where we can take a raw material input stream and print whatever objects we want. The next step would be to be able to make things out of exotic materials.

When I went to Staples to buy ink a couple weeks ago (yeah, I know, it was something of a printing emergency) the guy behind the counter was helpful in finding the ink I needed. And when he checked the price he said "You're probably better off buying a new printer." Refreshing honesty.

I did end up buying a new printer which fortunately was easy and trouble free to set up. (remember the rpinting emergency).

What to do with the old one? I've scavenged a lot of the parts out of it. Between it and another printer that I found on the sidewalk I have most of the parts I need to build a decent quality CNC machine. If I end up cycling through any more printers I'll start collecting parts for a 3D printer. (like RapRep or MakerBot.)