Slashdot Mirror
Cheap Fast Eyeglasses from a Desktop Fabricator
purduephotog writes "Doctoral candidate Saul Griffith of the Massachusetts Institute of Technology and inventor of the Lego powered chocolate printer was awarded the Lemelson-MIT Student Prize for inventing a device that molds eyeglasses rapidly and cheaply. Best of all, he's motivated for the good of humanity."
Griffith's thesis research is actually on "programmable self-assembly, how to make things automatically make things," he said.
:-)
This is the really interesting scientific angle of his work, and based on this, I would say that this small $30k prize is only the beginning for this guy. This approach demonstrates a unique perspective to problem solving that shows how innovative folks like Saul are. But perhaps more importantly for the future of science, science education, and the overall good, he has a social conscience that allowed him to identify a problem that affects people worldwide and has found an innovative solution that does what we all should aspire to do: Make a difference.
And he also makes the rest of us scientists look good.
Good on you Saul.
Visit Jonesblog and say hello.
... Doctor Saul Griffith of the Massachusetts Institute of Technology and inventor of the Lego powered chocolate printer and eyeglass moulder was awarded the Lemelson-MIT Doctoral Prize for inventing a device that cheaply and easily mouldes edible chocolate eyeglasses!
Imagine downloading and printing a new bowl for your food processor, or a new toy for your kid.
Imagine, too, the anguished hand-wringing of corporations over the illegal distribution of copyrighted object designs over the Internet.
Imagine, too, the anguished hand-wringing of governments when the technology reaches a point where you can print parts for an AK-47.
My bet is it's going to be quite the roller-coaster ride when it gets here, and that it's closer than we think...
Obliteracy: Words with explosions
..."in about an hour?"
n/t
I'm sure he'll be overjoyed when he graduates, finds himself unemployed and realizes just how much money he could have made and helped the world by patenting his invention and licensing it out.
I was starting to go blind from looking at all the pron on the internet.
thanks to this man, I will now be able to see better, faster and cheaper!
Hmm, a device that can automatically figure out your prescription, and another that can make cheap eyeglasses?
I see these popping up all over the place, like the "check your blood pressure here" devices.
If it means that more people who can't afford vision correction can get glasses, whether in a poor country or not, I'm all for it.
Happiness is like peeing yourself. Everybody can see it but only you can feel its warmth.
I didn't see this one coming...
On machines building machines, obviously starting with the T-100 series
Griffith... imagines that mass-produced dolls could be individualized by giving each a discrete face.
Get the Real Doll [NSFW] people on the phone, stat!
I looked into the abyss, and the abyss looked into me--and we both winked.
If you'd RTFA, you would have noticed that the device is patent-pending.
I could have sworn one optometrist i went to a few years ago had a machine that automatcially brought an image into focus for me. Way cooler than this stone-age notion of looking at the eye chart as the "doctor" flips lenses. Which one is clearer, one or two. Why do we keep doing this stone age crap?
I'm all for automatic vision testing, I feel like my current prescription was issued by a talentless hack.
Automatically testing vision and cranking out lenses is sweet. Next they just need to fire on an AR coating and everyone is good to go.
This sounded like even cooler tech to me. I like the idea of something that takes away the subjectivness of the traditional exam for a prescription. He could even throw a glaucoma tester into the goggles.
"He's lost in a 'floyd hole"
The pr0n is out of focus again. Time to print off some new glasses.
He does it in about 5-10 minutes.
FTA:
"what a great way to make sure a great invention never makes it big. I predict that in 10 years it will still have less than 5% market share. kind of like linux."
...
As opposed to, say, commercial stuff like Irix, which are
S
and this folks is what being a real team player is all about, in society where we tell our children that greed and selfishness is bad yet buisnesses teach us the exact opposite , that greed is good and if you are not making 500$ a second profit you are failing, these sorts of things dont come round enough, ask yourself why are you here ? to be a wage slave or to make a real difference to peoples lives
A>S
I'm interested in the uses of this machine behind eyeglasses. I've been working on several projects where we are creating instrumentation, and have been surprised to find that optics are both difficult to find in specific diameters and focal lengths, and rather expensive when you do find the optics you need.
While not a big deal to major corporations who don't balk at shelling out $20 a lens for custom work, for academic projects and independant research, that is a significant chunk of the cost of our prototype, considering the ease and realtive low cost involved in obtaining a microcontroller these days.
I imagine that, since he can make eye glasses, producing DCX, PCX, DCV, and PCV lenses would be easy too. I'd love to see this kind of machine available at academic institutions for producing parts for research.
If only more people in the world were motivated by altruism rather than the almighty dollar...
inventor of the Lego powered chocolate printer
I skimmed the paper, searched for Lego, and as it turns out he's really not uses Legos to power his system. It's merely built out of Legos. I'm disappointed...I thought he developed some sort of fusion generator, a la Back to the Future. Add a flux capacitor and a DeLorean and then I'll really be impressed.
glasses and eyesight used to be one of those really crazy scientific endeavours. how many of use have had huge, unwieldy glasses when we were younger, and trips to the optometrist were like going to some strange laboratory? things like this are fantastic, simplifying the field and making it more accessible to all. i heard about another system developed that can diagnose stimatism by analyzing the red-eye in a photograph. these kinds of scientific endeavours inspire others!
Additionally, the first opthalmologist I saw reckoned I was virtually blind in one eye. Offering to disprove this by closing the other one and seeing if I could still connect a punch presumably wouldn't have gone down too well...
There's no substitute for an experienced optician, where available. Of course, this work could help hundreds of thousands of people where there aren't.
Ph-nglui mglw'nafh Gates M'dna wgah'nagl fhtagn.
I doubt this would destroy a profession. It would take years for this to spread and there is still a need for Opthomologists. This would just make Optimologists a little less employable. This might actually increase eye glass sales. I know that I need a new perscription but I can't afford the $200 or more for even cheap exam, glasses and frames. If they could lower the cost of the exam, glasses and frames. I would mostly likely buy a new pair every year. I might even get a couple different types for different occations.
I hope his next machine makes the frames. The experiences of folks I know who wear glasses (I don't) has been that the lenses are not the biggest cost, it is the frames. Why do frames cost so damn much? I know super cheap frames would be fine for charitable aid to poor people just so they can see but the cost of your average frames, something that strikes me as pretty simple to make, is way too high in the US.
Are frames really that complex and hard to make or is there a lack of competition in the marketplace?
It is by the juice of the coffee bean that thoughts acquire speed, the teeth acquire stains. The stains become a warning
I want a desktop fabricator that can create a desktop fabricator.
Mmm.... Recursion...
He would need to invent transparent chocolate first, and if that can not be a billion dollar business, then transparent aluminum most certainly will be.
Wow... could it be that in a few years, traditional eye doctors will become obsolete, replaced by scientists and machine assemblers who never see a patient. I'm taking this from the guy who said he could see these next to the blood pressure machine in wal-mart.
Could this be the writing on the wall for any similar "traditionally" professional occupations. If this is the case for eye doctors, which I'm sure didn't "SEE" this coming, I wonder what's next. Could there be a machine that analyzes your blood and prescribes through a vending machine your prescription?
OR... could I be thinking the insane thinking that many slashdotters and other people do when this type of thing is first invented.
Remember that cars were going to fly long before the year 2000.
Certainly every man at his best state is but vapor
Having -8.5 dioptre I can imagine how it would suck to life without noseglasses.
Well, thanks to this man there might soon be roughly 1 billion people less with such a problem.
Good Job.
Read "Anthem" by Ayn Rand to find out exactly what would happen if more people in the world were motivated by altruism rather than the almighty dollar.
Isn't that aluminum oxide commonly called alumina?
Here's his first glasses prototype! Welcome back to the eighties! ;)
But seriously this guy made two wonderfull inventions. They now collect "old" glasses to send to third world but this is a logistics nightmare.
Imagine a simple jeep outfitted with these inventions doing the rounds in poor areas. Put the tester on and voila few minutes later a pair of glasses. 1 day per village. Couple of jeeps. Shouldn't take long at all (after all it is not like glasses need to replaced that often, even in the west once a year is good enough even for still growing kids).
As far as I know it ain't the material that is costly in glasses but the whole distribution process. Plenty of bargain chains around that can offer really really cheap glasses due to scale and not offering specialist lenses. This looks even cheaper for hard to reach areas.
Brilliant.
MMO Quests are like orgasms:
You may solo them, I prefer them in a group.
"Tell me which view is better: choice 1 or choice 2?"
"Um..."
Get your mod points ready...
I "like" how the story posters of slashdot are blinded by these bland phrases like "good of humanity". What exactly does that mean here? Is he giving it away for free? No, but it will be cheap. Is he opening the IP up? No, it's patent pending. In fact he's begining to sound like a (*gasp*) capitalist! And we all know they been knocked around here enough to be demonized. But unsuprisingly when a capitalist helps the poor by helping himself he's a put up on a pedastal as the savior of humanity, but if he helps himself by helping the rich or even just the middle class he's deridded as a scum sucking bottom feeder business man. Why the double standard, slashdot? Why? Is it because the motives seem more pure or somehow more righteous? That perhaps, because poor people get the short end of the stick all over the world that they don't just need help, but somehow deserve it too? That we are compelled to serve them? And when we don't feel compelled by this directive we've somehow failed at an obvious yet never stated goal of life?
What this guy has done is great, not because it will help poor people but because he's been extremely clever. I hope he makes an assload of money. Of course once he does make a reasonable sum, some people will complain that his motives aren't pure anymore. One can only hope they can synthesize becoming rich and helping poor people in the same thought.
The next remark is false. The previous remark is true.
In more upbeat stores frames are closer to designer clothing. You pay because the costs of designing a new model is only spread over a few models. Ford Focus costs less then say the latest ferrari and that ain't just the cost of manufacturing.
But yes for those in need a single frame design in a couple of sizes (for different size heads) is not that expensive. Just ask any army that used to issue soldiers with glasses. Or for that matter look at the cost of sunglasses.
MMO Quests are like orgasms:
You may solo them, I prefer them in a group.
Not at all - they'd be sunglasses!
We Build Beautiful Websites
He is sued by the people who makes the eyeglasses today?
Griffith has created a prototype device to test the human eye.
;)
I have a scientist friend who's currently researching myopia. I must tell him about this! I'm not too familiar with the nature of his research, but I do know that he's harvested roughly 3000 chicken eyes while gathering data... not sure what he does with them... sorry
The article is pretty vague about the workings and capabilities of this prototype. Does anyone have more information on this?
I ran a benchmark on my quantum computer, now I can't find it anywhere!
Why the parent is a Troll?
I know it's 10AM in the US and american slashdotters are the majority right now... But the is a new low... even for american slashdotters...
Does the eyeglass maker automagically engrave "IHTFP" into each lens?
I do know that he's harvested roughly 3000 chicken eyes while gathering data... not sure what he does with them
Just don't eat any tapioca pudding at his house, ok?
And you think printer cartridges are expensive now!
they have pretty cheap frames in all the cool geek retro styles.
www.eyeglass.com
This post is intensely confusing. I have no trouble with your suggested "synthesis". If that was the point of your rant, let it be known that it didn't help me at all.
Perhaps you do have a lot of trouble grokking that synthesis yourself, and that is why you're projecting this schizophrenic jumble onto slashdot?
Sheesh - I can't tell - are you just bitter, or what?
And WTF, +5 INSIGHTFUL? Exactly what 'insight' is there here? It seems that his point is smothered in the 8th grader's version of Ayn Rand.
Usually, there is no interest in finding solutions for the world's poor - because the profit margins are vanishingly small compared to selling things to the world's middle and upper classes.
This guy is great because, while he will be trying to make some money (guy's gotta eat, you know), he engineered a solution for a problem everyone overlooked because despite the potential for improving a great number of people's quality of life, the potential profit margin was too low.
Personally, I think he needs to package this system up and sell it and supplies to the four-eyed with money first. I'd like to be able to print out new lenses whenever I wanted, and if his process really is so much better, it would be cheaper than buying every couple of years from my optometrist.
From what I understand, he's taking a few months off from radio, but his show will re-appear as a local, Washington-centric show on SportsTalk 980.
Yeah, all the eye tests I've had in the last few years have started with the machine. I'm told that some places just use the machine, but I've never seen one and I wouldn't go to one.
I go to the eye doctor to have my eyes checked. This is more than just get the correct glasses. The doctor needs to look in my eye and make sure that all the pieces are still in place.
I've heard of several different problems that need to be checked for once in a while. They all have complex medical names that I haven't a hope of spelling. See your eye doctor regularly and make sure that if you get one of them, it is corrected early.
Well, you must admit the original analogy was flawed and your posts parent corrected it.
Bot Assisted Blogging
Hmmm, yeah I see. So basically you really have no point with respect to the comment, but you really felt the need to post something anyways. Thank you for blessing us with your wonderful insights!
I'd like to see how good a interferometric telescope would a beowulf cluster of those would make...
"Griffith's patent-pending device essentially eliminates these problems."
Yes, and this is exactly what patents are for, new useful non-obvious inventions. His invention will help a lot of people and I hope he gets money from it so he will be encouraged to make more useful products.
It's called sapphire (or Corundum ). It's used for windows for all sorts of exotic applicaions.
the preceding comment is my own and in no way reflects the opinion of the Joint Chiefs of Staff
I fail to see anyone telling you that you're obligated to help, so why did you even bother posting?
Neal Stephenson's The Diamond Age was a good fiction book on the effects of a society where people have their own personal matter reconstruction equipment. Those with the cheap units are subjected to lives full of cheap commodity throwaway (but completley recyclable!) things, while those with more money for the better equipment can have better, higher quality things. And those able to afford real hand-made objects seem to hold themselves above all that.
"Beware of he who would deny you access to information, for in his heart, he dreams himself your master."
If he's so into helping humanity, he'd give way away his invention.
Saul also designs and builds open source kites.
See his website at www.zeroprestige.org.
It'll be interesting to see if eyeglasses are as needed in the long run.
Sure the will be, especially if you're allergic to Retinax V.
The only reason we have the rights we have is that people just like us died to gain those rights. -- Cheerio Boy
The best bit of this is the automatic it actually finds the correct lens for you eye.
.But this has got to make to whole process so much easier especially when trying to prescribe lenses for young children or those with communication (eg speach) difficulties.
At last something can put on your face and a few minutes later have a correct setting for the lens you need.
I'm sure all the opticians/optomatrists will be sad to loose they jobs (or at least part of the job) to and automated system
The fact it then goes off and quickly makes the lens is purely a plus point in my view.
Doesn't SCO own the IP on this already?
Not "opening the IP up" would be manufacturing a "black box" that creates eyeglasses that cannot be opened or studied in any way, at least not without the lawyers/hit squad coming after you. The inventor would still have exclusive control over the rights to manufacture it, but no other person would be able to study it in any way.
"Heavens, it appears that my weewee has been stricken with rigor mortis!" -- Stewie Griffin
>> "what a great way to make sure a great invention never makes it big. I predict that in 10 years it will still have less than 5% market share. kind of like linux."
...
> As opposed to, say, commercial stuff like Irix, which are
Lesson being that unless there's some lying and deceit going on, it ain't gonna cut the mustard in the lovely world we built for ourselves.
Must-not-watch TV!
I have wondered if it were possible to make a program that could help determine the shape of the corrective lens needed for a vision defect.
Since with high resolution monitors and 256 (or more)levels of gray available, it should be possible to create an 'eye chart' that looks bleary and out-of-focus to a normally-sighted person but sharp and clearly-focused to someone with deformed vision.
I imagine a program where the user can adjust the software implementations (precise changes on the screen regards to the blurring of the chart characters that mimic the effect of an individual lens) of the various corrective lens stages of an eye exam. When the user is seeing clear and focused characters on the eye chart, the program would know from the distortions of the normal chart needed to create this clarity exactly what the eyeware prescription would need to be for this individual user.
The user could send the eyeglass perscription to a off-shore eyeware maker and get perscription glasses made at a tiny fraction of inflated American prices. Or order the glasses made by the method developed by the subject of this article.
If you read about the history of eyeglasses, you'll learn that back in the middle ages, when what we, today, call "proper" eyeglasses (not just a simple magnifier, but a lens that corrects for nearsightedness or farsightedness) - were invented, in Venice Italy, their fabrication was a carefully guarded trade secret. Corrective eyeglasses were for the extremely wealthy only. Among the extremely wealthy, of course, were the keepers of this secret.
Think about the millions of people who were functionally blind, and could not afford glasses due to this trade secret.
And now - due to openness of the technique, and this new technology, optical health insurance (and the incredibly obnoxious markups on lenses and frames that came with it) may no longer be necessary. Let's hope so.
These are my friends, See how they glisten. See this one shine, how he smiles in the light.
People like Saul employ. They do not need to be employed.
an ill wind that blows no good
hey, even the rimless (like that dude from CSI-LV) frames are good.
The discount eyeglass makers in my city are offering two pairs of glasses with frames & lenses (subject to some extreme prescriptions) plus eye exam for $69. Can this new technology keep up with the relentless cost-cutting in conventional technology?
I tried to include that pun in the summary, but no matter how I tried I simply couldn't get it in there. It was hard enough finding a link to the chocolate printer ;)
but likely more expensive.
I had an eye exam a couple of weeks ago at a new doctor, and they had me look into a machine that took a simple image (like a children's book illustration of a house) and made it go from super blurry to much too sharp, and then repeated the process I think 5 times total. Based on that, the tech said she had at minimum a X% (I think it was 95, might have been 98) accurate match for my prescription, even with a pretty bad astigmatism.The opthamologist then honed it down to the precise prescription from there. But even 95-98% is extremely good and would have worked quite well for me... if his invention can do that for people and then turn around and create the lenses quickly, that would be fantastic.
Of course, if the companies that make frames get involved, those developing countries will be bankrupted. Maybe he can come up with one that prints nice looking frames for under $100.. or even better, one that says "sure, we can use your old frames"
No way in hell do I want someone trashing a webserver that can't handle it.
Besides, the original piece was a PDF. Want to see how long that took to destroy the server?
Which reminded me of something. When reading Kim Stanley Robinson's there are some references to a character wearing a tootheye. I could never figure out what this was. Even google is no help.
Non-Linux Penguins ?
However the "Ice Board" cartoon looks like it could use some sort of legal disclaimer or "ask your parents for help" text. This kid is going to end up slicing himself in half! I'm not even a parent and that cartoon scares me.
is it any good? If so, what does that say about the triangle of cheap, fast and good? Honestly, since I am behind a proxy I have a hard time reading these articles, does it say anything about the quality of the glasses it can produce?
I was going to make a wise-ass remark at the expense of Rand, but a serious reference to her in this context is funnier than anything I could have come up with.
Griffith's patent-pending device essentially eliminates these problems.
While I'd truly agree that this is innovative, and definitely worth a patent, I can't help but wonder whether the patent will remain under Griffith's control, and for, as the summary suggests, humanitarian purposes. I hope that 5 years from now we're not seeing Microsoft Eyeglass v1.0, available only on a heavily DRM'ed machine, and only via a huge annual licensing fee.
I used to purchase my glasses from a "dispensing optician" when I lived in Toronto. The way it worked was that I paid his cost for the lenses and frames, and a fee for his share in things. Lenses were less than CDN$10 a pair (in 1993). So the invention is interesting, but the notion of lessening the cost is unlikely. The cost of lenses is small, but the margin on lenses is high.
--- Bill
No pun intended.
I have keratoconus (basically a deformity in the cornea) and some days I can see fine and some days things are a little blury. The only solutions are either rigid contact lenses (ick) or cornea replacement surgery (double ick). Glasses aren't much of a solution for me because my eyes shift so much that a prescription would maybe last a month or two at most.
Maybe with this device I could cheaply fab lenses that would work for me until my eyes morph again. And then all I'd need to do is fab another pair.
I have trouble with passwords among other things.
I knew someone who was an actual grad student from MIT. According to this individual more than 98% of the inventions NEVER see the consumer markets.
I don't think this is limited to MIT. Alot of schools end up OWNING your invention since it was innovated on college campus.
As a result... the student often have a choice. Either get the school rich or nobody get rich.
Think of the lawsuits... He better sell it anywhere but the US. Attorneys will put him out of business very quickly.
All someone has to do is claim that his machine made their eyesight worse, and that will be it. Before you know it hundreds will be on the bandwagon for a class action suit.
He is working against an *army* of optometrists, and opthamalogists who would gladly sit in a courtroom as an expert witness, since his machine replaces them.
Hopefully he just sells this in other countries.
l8,
AC
Those blood pressure machines at the drug store sucks BTW. They're wildly inaccurate and serve little other purpose than to scare peopl einto talking to their doctor. Which I suppose saves some lives, but don't trust the numbers you get for a second.
My doctor tells me this.
Off topic? Yup.
Saul, here is an idea for you.
:)
Why glasses?
Why not straight to the root of the problem?
How about a low-cost, self-administered laser eye-surgeon machine?
Or maybe even further, some iris muscle(?) adjuster nanosomething?
Or further down the road, a gene screening and adjusting nanosomething for pregnant women, so that perfect sight corrections would be achieved at the fetus state?
Okay, that may cause Suppressed fetus memory syndrome, and all the legal craps that follows, right?
How about egg or sperm penetration pre-treatment?
Possibly combined with some afrozediac...
Ah... I just love that my mind can go high without any chems
What is not mentioned is how this eyeglassmaking device will deal with aberrations of the Lens, IIRC there's spheric,chromatic and one other aberration that have to be dealt with in eyeglasses making them quite hard to produce.
Other Problem I see is the durability of the lenses depends on the coating , which means that a lens made of one Plastic can easily scratch.
Also these without coating will reflect a lot.
Also an automatic refractometer might not detect a compensated Hyperopia (The lens in the eye will accomodate by going +1 or +x diopters) these people will see well but have Strabismus or headaches, but not problems with visual accuity. So having a qualified person treating them will still have to be necessary.
But apart from these problems there is definitely a market for cheap glasses in third world countries.
Good Job.
Places like LensCrafters exist for one main reason: people get their new glasses the same day. This technology would allow them to crank them out even faster. You would spend more time picking out the frames than you would for the lenses being made. Since the process would be cheaper and faster, you will have more people buying glasses to accessorize like they do shoes.
the good ground has been paved over by suicidal maniacs
empty soda cans! Get a shopping cart. Wander around picking up garbage.
Put in fabricator. Profit!
Is is just me, or does the photo in the article look like he's holding a certain 'device' from Austin Power #1?
It's too bad the original article doesn't say anything about how he makes lenses.
The current trick in low-cost eyeglass distribution for the third world is simply to use a kit of low-cost preformed round plastic lenses. Basic eyeglasses have a spherical component, a cylindrical component, and an axis for the cylindrical component. The lenses are round, and can snap into the frames at different rotations, the number of different lenses needed goes down to a hundred or so. And the whole kit fits in a briefcase.
I wish I could find the article but a plant had one of their rollers go down on the line. Replacement parts would take 2 days, minimum, to arrive- so on a whim they had one fab'd from the rapid prototyper. They figured if it lasted 2 days it was worth it to get back up.
In fact, it ran longer than that, so they left it in place and kept the 'original' replacement part as a spare.
It's a rather funny read; sadly I can't recall where it was.
Why would only poor people want really cheap glasses, in only 5 minutes?
There may be some good reason- Perhaps the glasses are low quality, and we would rather pay with time and money for higher quality glasses.
But I wonder- Is this a demonstration of a pattern in media reporting? I've seen articles about robotics that seem to avoid the conclusion "these people don't need jobs any more." I've seen them focus on "this robot will assist humans," when it seemed like, based on what the article said, it would greatly reduce the need for humans.
And, in this other article, about attaching nerves to chips. What does the article say is so cool about this? "The findings could help in the design of devices that combine electronic components and brain cells. That includes controlling artificial limbs or restoring sight for the visually impaired." Okay- but what about hard-core interaction between the brain and the computer? What about putting pictures directly into the brain, or using your mind to work on the computer? Those seem like obvious implications. Why does the article pussy-foot around them?
Is this a real pattern in media reporting, or am I just seeing patterns that aren't there, and support some world view of mine?
I really want to understand this.
Actually, most single-vision prescription eyeglasses that you buy at Lenscrafters can be done in about 5-10 minutes; only really strong prescriptions (or bifocals or progressives -- any lens you actually have to grind and polish in the lab) take an hour, and even those usually only take 40 minutes or so.
One-hour labs carry a huge stock of pre-ground, polished and coated single-vision lens blanks around 75mm in diameter. All the lab techs have to do is edge the lens so it fits the frame of your choice.
I was a lab tech at EyeMasters (a short-lived, unregretted Canadian Lenscrafters competitor) for two years. My record was two minutes, twelve seconds from the moment we got the order to the moment the glasses were out the door. These were $500 eyeglasses (and this was ten years ago), with very nice Pentax lenses. It was a lazy Sunday afternoon, and the lab manager and I (the most experienced non-management tech at the time) were the only ones working. Ian grinned at me and said "Let's see how fast we can get this done."
We worked in tandem, he pulled the lenses, I marked them up, he traced the frame, I edged the lenses, he fined the sharp edges off, I had the frame heated up and popped the lenses in, and he did the final prescription, axis and PD checks. Not surprisingly given our experience level, they were absolutely bang on (the law here in Canada, at least at the time, allowed for a maximum quarter-diopter variance; these were perfect).
The customer had chatted with the optician out front for a moment after she'd handed in our job. Ian caught him just as he was walking out the door:
"Sir. Sir! Your glasses are ready."
"I'm sorry; there must be some mistake. I just barely submitted my order."
"I know, sir. They're done. Why don't you let the optician fit them for you?"
Jen double-checked everything (by law, the dispensing optician must) and gave us an "OK, I'm impressed" look and a thumbs-up.
We always used to laugh at those Lenscrafters commercials that would show a stopwatch stopping at, say, 54 minutes. Try a tenth of that. The one-hour promise just gives enough buffer time to redo 95%+ of all jobs (sometimes twice) if you screw up.
http://howtoons.net/
I wonder if the technology uses fuzzy logic?
I read Usenet for the articles.
The guy is pretty amazing. This site he's involved with is phenomenally creative.
And as if helping 5% of 1 Billion people see better was anything to sneer at...
Information: "I want to be anthropomorphized"
I thought that corundum was the mineral form of Al2O3 and as such contains impurities which colour it as in the case of sapphire or ruby? I thought the pure form was alumunia although it has been at least 10 years since I did chemistry at college so I could quite easily be wrong.
...nuff said. who did give mr. gates mod points? it get modded insightful...
Exhibit One: Saul , right after Foo Camp.
"This...is going to change...my life..." he says.
"A wireless rotary saw?" says I.
"Ice racing."
Ah.
--Dan
Like 500% or more
Ok, call me an ogre, but do glasses really have to
be custom made? I don't believe so. My vision
was measured around 4.00 diopters which was
something like 20/300. Anyway my siblings and parents
all had vision which varied between 3 and 5 and because
I used to constantly break my glasses and could get by
amazingly well with their glasses. I know it wasn't perfect,
but I would wear them for months at a time.
I honestly think you could do more good for less money
by mass producing lenses in common diopters settings and
just letting the buyer pick his own, like pants or shirt
size. If the buyer wants to pay extra money to get 20/20
vision instead of 20/40 then let him.
Look at something like prescription lenses for sporting
equipment. Often that stuff is only sold in 0.5 diopter
increments (i.e. 1.0-1.5-2.0-2.5...etc)
I can hear the naysayers now, spurning the idea of micro-entrepreneurs with minimal training providing cheap eyecare. No, they will say, you're foisting substandard goods and services on third world people! These are the same people who close down homeless employment centers for failing to provide a health care plan.
Maybe the eyecare won't be the same quality that highly educated optometrists and opthalmologists could provide. People might occasionally get the wrong glasses! But for the vast numbers of people who put up with bad eyesight because by industrialized standards they are effectively living in the 19th Century or earlier, this could be a great thing.
He has the nutters to do someting good for humanity. It takes balls to try and create something for the better before he gets corupted by corporations. Youthfull naivete at its greatest. He's made more of himself than many of us ever will
Well if we can get this thing into enough hands, some bright spark will come up with a way that some form of projectile weapon can be made within the limitations of the device. And the designs will circulate as Open Source and improve as they pass from hand to hand.
:v)
A version of a 3d-printed weapon that could be produced now would probably require some inserts, but the design could be configurable to match the specific components available.
A stubby length of old vaccuum cleaner tubing might reinforce a barrel or combustion chamber. Things like wire will be needed for ignition systems, and possibly batteries or priming compounds.
Stored energy can readily be derived from compressed gas, butane lighters, or the chlorates formed by the enthusiastic electrolysis of strong brine.
The requirements for machining metal are not needed to make effective weapons, and the materials are not limited to just the resin. Channels can be left in the printer parts for reinforcement by inserts, epoxy, stronger resins etc. up to the point of merely being a mould.
Sounds possible to do it with available fabs to me. You just need the right kind of creative person in the right place at the right time.
Vik
Ayn Rand seems to be losing 5 to 2 in this forum. I am losing faith in nerds.
The cost of the exam is about 1/4th the cost of your $200 glasses. Even if it were just a $5 copay
I still wouldn't get my eyes checked more than once every several years. Every time in my life I had
an eye exam, my vision had mysticly worsened. So they gave me stronger glasses. So my vision got
worse. So they gave me stronger glasses. So my vision got worse... {repeat for 20 years}...
In an effort to stop the abusive cycle, I had Lazik surgery last Saturday. I now see 20/20.
And for the first time ever, I can now buy several different types of SUNGLASSES for different occasions.
"God is dead." - Frederik Nietzsche
And after destroying you, they will laugh, and then stand over your body and put their hands on their hips and laugh at you -- you, destroyed, destroyed by them, the SATs.
[n/t]