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Defcad.com Wants To Be the Google of 3D-Printable Guns
Sparrowvsrevolution writes that at this year's SXSW, Defense Distributed founder Code Wilson has announced a for-profit spinoff of his gun-printing project, from which people will be able to search for and download gun-related CAD files.
"Though the search engine will index all types of files, Wilson says he hopes the group's reputation for hosting politically incendiary content will mean users trust that it won't censor search results. 'When we say you should have access to these files, people believe we mean that,' says Wilson. 'No takedowns. No removals. We'd fight everything to the full extent of the law.' Along with the SXSW announcement, Wilson also released a provocative video where he lays out the plan for Defcad.com and criticizes gun control advocates and 'collusive' 3D printing companies like Makerbot."
is who would name their kid "Code". My second thought is "duh, I'm on Slashdot".
Hmm .. is history about to repeat itself? I seem to remember there used to be a bunch of mp3 hosting sites that aren't here now. I'm guessing that this guy will be headed to oblivion once people start up-loading 3d scans of copywrited material - whether it is from a gun manufacturer or from Disney.
Good luck finding somewhere safe to host the servers.
I am Slashdot. Are you Slashdot as well?
Better just move the hosting to North Korea right now and get it over with, lol.
"It's a .44 Defcad, the most powerful handgun made, and it'll blow your head clean off. So - hey, knock it off with the laughter!"
Two great causes that go great together.
If you're a first amendment activist, you should be opposed to takedown efforts because censorship is bad, whether you're talking about porn, Wikileaks, DeCSS or 3D printer plans for guns.
And Code (really? Code?) should hook up with the NRA and get their lobbying dollars on his side. After all, 3D printers don't kill people, people WITH 3D printers kill people.
(Alternate joke: you can take my extrusion depositor when you pry it from my cold, dead hands!)
We don't have a state-run media we have a media-run state.
What you are doing is perfectly legal, has been for years. The plans to build all sorts of guns have been out for ages. The government really doesn't care because making a gun is perfectly legal. Calling it "hosting politically incendiary content" isn't going to make it so. It isn't going to be the Big Bad Government that is going to take you down either, it is the wife of the guy that has one of your designs blow up in his face that is going to soak up every dime you are worth. Go ask Paladin Press how it works, I am sure they will give you an ear full.
Slashdot, where armchair scientists get shouted down and armchair theologians get modded up.
So for a CAD file of a gun, the CAD file could be copyrighted... but it would be copyrighted by the author, not by the manufacturer of the gun it was a clone of (unless they were the author, of course). Now, printing out the gun might be manufacturing something covered by patents... but copying the file wouldn't be creating the gun.
3D printing will sure be interesting from a legal standpoint, it potentially brings copyright and patent law together for just about everything. I would hope that we could establish that CAD files for 3D printers are equal to recipes for the purposes of copyright: a series of steps to create something. But that's certainly not what happened for source code.
-- Erich
Slashdot reader since 1997
It will happen. The CNC machine and the 3D printer will morph together. I will be able to program my own gun parts design and share/sell it over the Internet. People will improve on my design and we will have much better guns and other products. Can you imagine 10 million people working on a design for the perfect AR15? Colt can't pay 10 million designers, just like Microsoft can't pay the millions of programmers that have written tho open source software we use every day.
How about before you become the google of something you prove that this even exists.
Show me a working 3d printed gun. Not a lower for an AR, not a magazine, but an actually working 3d printed gun. That means you have to 3d print the parts that go bang. Otherwise you are just 3d printing gun accessories.
False dichotomy.
Why can't it be both?
I want to be the Google of naming things "The Google of ..."
XKCD:Xeric Knowledge Comically Dispen
Real guns are generally made of quality metals and/or very high quality ceramics.
Until your 3D printer can do those, you're just printing a really cheap-ass stock.
Your political party doesn't care about your rights and only represents corporate interests.
Can I 3D print a Mosin Nagant for cheaper than buying one yet?
In this case, it would be probably a design patent they could be infringing on, or a trade dress they violate.
False dichotomy.
Why can't it be both?
Fair enough - closeted homosexual with diminutive phallus it is!
An enigma, wrapped in a riddle, shrouded in bacon and cheese
Two words: Not really.
Unless you can show me the 3D printer which will withstand upwards of 1500 C. And, no, gluing the stuff together is not a good idea.
Tor Hidden Services
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tor_(anonymity_network)#Hidden_services
Learning HOW to think is more important than learning WHAT to think.
I wonder if you can "3D print a DVD". You submit the AutoCad drawing of a circular disk, even down to the small etchings in the resin (that may or may not contain copyrighted content).
That wouldn't constitute piracy would it? It's just digital representation of a a physical object. =)
Yes, 100 million gun owners all have them because they wish their penises were longer.
So, Anonymous Coward, if it has nothing to do with your small penis, if all your guns were bright pink you'd be perfectly find with that?
Yes, 100 million gun owners all have them because they wish their penises were longer.
So, Anonymous Coward, if it has nothing to do with your small penis, if all your guns were bright pink you'd be perfectly find with that?
You don't have to have a small penis to not like bright pink as a color, or a penis at all. :P
That said, if people only own guns to make their penis feel bigger then why do women own them? Old men?
Also, bright pink is a really impractical color for a gun but it'll do the job no matter what color it is.
I was raised on the command line, bitch
"Nemo me impune lacesset"
Ceramics--not really. Glock had this but quickly learned they were junk. High grade polymers--basicaly good quality plastic-- are now very common in firearms and have proven durability that rivals steel, with the added benefit of not rusting or adding lots of weight
I'm being a bit pedantic, but I think you catch my drift.
Actually a distracting color like pink can buy you some time to get the first shot.
“He’s not deformed, he’s just drunk!”
I hate gun nuts as much as you, and yet I applaud what he is doing. We need more repositories for printable 3D objects on the Internet.
In the US there is a tradition of unsavory characters you wouldn't leave alone with your dog defending your freedoms. People like Larry Flynt and RMS and this guy.
Any time these people do anything I can't help but feel like they are shills with the express purpose of providing an excuse to legislate 3D printing into the ground.
By that logic, Gutenburg was a shill for the original copyright laws.
An enigma, wrapped in a riddle, shrouded in bacon and cheese
It will happen. The CNC machine and the 3D printer will morph together. I will be able to program my own gun parts design and share/sell it over the Internet. People will improve on my design and we will have much better guns and other products. Can you imagine 10 million people working on a design for the perfect AR15? Colt can't pay 10 million designers, just like Microsoft can't pay the millions of programmers that have written tho open source software we use every day.
What good is a gun without ammunition? (what if instead of controlling guns, the US govt would switch to ban ammunition and/or gun powder and/or primers? It'd be just as simple as to make "illegal to possess or handle explosives in any shape, form or packaging without a license"... this in the name of "the war on terror")
Questions raise, answers kill. Raise questions to stay alive.
lol... yes i can imagine this. 2-3 people actually doing work and producing good designs and 9,999,998 people making brain dead changes which produce exploding guns. 10 Million "designers" is a bad idea for any project, most will not be qualified for anything and all, most of the rest will be "grunt work only" qualified.
Can you imagine 10 million people working on a design for the perfect AR15? Colt can't pay 10 million designers, just like Microsoft can't pay the millions of programmers that have written tho open source software we use every day.
When your software blows up in your face it's embarrasing.
When your AR15 does the same?
(Anyway, it's already been done - it's called the HK416)
Watch this Heartland Institute video
What is this? The dailymail? Front page story without substance?
3d printable guns? As in water guns for kids? Or do you mean real guns? You can't even make a 3d printer hotend with a 3d printer, how would printing a working gun be possible?
What's next, search engines with 3d printable nuclear warheads?
The only reason why this is even a story is because people make a big deal out of it. "Spirit of defiance" and all that (nevermind that it's perfectly legal). Note that the guy's message is less about the utility of the thing, and more about giving the middle finger to "them".
Well, FWIW, that is a far more useful purpose than counterfeiting Darth Vader bobbleheads. And a lot less likely to run afoul of current IP law.
An enigma, wrapped in a riddle, shrouded in bacon and cheese
Real guns are generally made of quality metals and/or very high quality ceramics.
Until your 3D printer can do those, you're just printing a really cheap-ass stock.
Or, you're printing a really cheap-ass mold for the high-grade stock you're going to make later.
Until someone comes out with a high-grade polymer for 3D printers, I think this (using the printed item as a mold for further production) will be the way to go.
An enigma, wrapped in a riddle, shrouded in bacon and cheese
1. There are plenty of people with access to a machine shop and the correct skills to build a gun right now. And they can build *all* the parts, including ones exposed to gasses and pressures different than ambient air. This adds nothing new.
2. If in fact home 3D printing gets to the point that you can actually manufacture a working gun (not just a "part") then it is also going to be able to manufacture replacement car parts, replacement parts for other machines, or entire machines. Then they are going to get attacked by the people who own the copyrights and trademarks on those designs who are relying on their control of the design for their own profit. I predict these guys will fold in a week and remove all trademark-infringing content, which will probably put in perspective the relative power of the "evvvvil govmint is trying to take my guns" verses other things in the current world.
How can something like SXSW let a dangerous gun nut speak?
Same way Slashdot lets stupid marginalizing assholes like you speak - they respect the First Amendment.
You, obviously, do not.
Why are we letting this small group of very insane people get so much speaking time on our media?
Uh, Equal Time Provision maybe? Gotta provide a counter-point to all those left-wing fringe lunatics who also receive a fair amount of media attention.
The whole point of printable guns is to bypass laws and safeguards meant to keep dangerous weapons out of the hands of the mentally unstable.
No, it's not.
Correspondingly, there is a huge intersection between the mentally ill and gun nuts because crazy people hoard weapons and are obsessed with defense and doomsday scenarios.
No, there's not.
Side note: I never have figured out how someone like this AC can, in one breath, refer to anyone who disagrees with them as "insane people," then subsequently posit some seriously off-his-nut shit not a paragraph later, and not realize the hypocrisy.
Then again, perhaps that's a side effect of being a loon - you say crazy shit and don't notice.
An enigma, wrapped in a riddle, shrouded in bacon and cheese
Seed autonomous, self-powered file servers throughout the world. Allow anyone to upload/download information from them. Then there will be no way to ever limit information again.
If not us, who? If not now, when?
I do wonder then if you can use other fuels as a propellant, anything from propane onwards can be compressed and ignited to force a projectile, not unlike in an IC engine.
What is the government going to do? Ban everything from Gasoline onwards? No flammable fuels anymore?
That does not even touch on the fact that gunpowder is trivial to make yourself. If people could make it hundreds of years ago with their technology level, I'm sure a suitably driven individual could do it now in his backyard.
Makerbot will not me getting my money however, closed their source and censorship. That says to me they are really not interested in my business.
Got Code?
I am quite certain that for the time being (as long as we have at least 5 rational people as part of SCOTUS) ammunition will be considered as fundamentally inseparable from "arms."
What you are doing is perfectly legal, has been for years.
That's very true.
But it ALSO didn't stop the plans from being yanked from other 3D printing repositories.
And it ALSO did not stop a printer manufacturer from pulling a 3D printer that he had already rented, and refusing to allow him to rent.
To me it doesn't matter WHO he is fighting, what matters is that in a short time he has seen very real censorship around this topic and thus exhibited a strong need for what he is providing. So in fact, contrary to your opinion there are a LOT of people who give a damn that even unpopular material is allowed to be published.
"There is more worth loving than we have strength to love." - Brian Jay Stanley
It's going to be a struggle for government to implement a ban that covers only a certain class of semi-auto rifles and accessories. A full ban on ammunition? They'd probably do it if they could, but I don't see it happening anytime in the near term.
What good is a gun without ammunition?
Given that the person you are aiming the gun at has no idea if it is loaded or not, actually pretty good as a deterrent.
That ignores of course the incredible ease with which you can make something to fire out of a gun (worst case, you can make a breech-loader and fire anything at all).
"There is more worth loving than we have strength to love." - Brian Jay Stanley
What good is a gun without ammunition? (what if instead of controlling guns, the US govt would switch to ban ammunition and/or gun powder and/or primers? It'd be just as simple as to make "illegal to possess or handle explosives in any shape, form or packaging without a license"... this in the name of "the war on terror")
Banning ammo would be even harder. Although few do it some people make their own ammo. Making gunpowder is and isn't easy. Ammo shells can repeatedly be reused. And it's easy to form new slugs by melting old ones.
Falcon
Should there be a Law?
Exactly.
Whenever some fool suggests that government should ban ammunition instead of guns, I suggest that they bring a case of ammo across the border and try to convince U.S. customs that it doesn't fall under the classification of "arms".
Every country in the world treats ammunition as "arms" from an import/export and regulatory standpoint.
I like big bright pink penors.
Ammo shells can repeatedly be reused. And it's easy to form new slugs by melting old ones.
Slugs are not a problem. Now, tell me about caps/primers.
Questions raise, answers kill. Raise questions to stay alive.
Paging Mr Luty....
And FWIW, anyone who knows their way around the Harbor Freight catalog is just as "dangerous". Knowing CNCZone exists is also a warning sign.
That said, if people only own guns to make their penis feel bigger then why do women own them?
Loose vaginas
only for you, she doesn't want to be a bad mother and hurt your feelings.
I've read numerous slashdot posts on freedom to do what someone wants with hardware they have bought, or hacking the device to expand its capabilities or do something with it that wasn't intended. I'm not much of a tinkerer myself but I always agreed with freedom to do whatever you want with what you own. So how do people feel about this? How could it possibly be prevented?
This isn't even a hack; instead of print these parts it's simply print these which so happen to assemble into a firearm.
When I first heard of 3d printing I was really impressed and thought of lots of practical applications for this new tech but for some reason I never thought of weapons. Once I heard of that I thought that this crosses a line. I certainly don't want it where someone can just go home and print a gun. And then I read about ammo being printed: http://www.forbes.com/sites/andygreenberg/2013/01/14/gunsmiths-3d-print-high-capacity-ammo-clips-to-thwart-proposed-gun-laws/
This is the first time a new tech that could very well become commonplace in the home has given me pause.
And short of making 3d printers illegal, what could be done even if desired?
Print in wax and use lost wax.
There aren't many materials that you can cast in plastic molds.
John McAfee 'It was like that time I hired that Bangkok prostitute; to do my taxes, while I fucked my accountant'
All parts of any legal gun are legal for anyone to make for their own use. This is only news because of the anti gun agenda of the media.
I suspect violation the ITAR and Arms Export Control Act will lead to a far more speedy shutdown of such a "service" than a protacted copyright or patent case might.
Patent litigation: A doctrine of Mutually Assured Destruction... in which everyone seems willing to push the button
My guns are primarily for hunting, some species are colorblind but others are not. I don't own "shiny" guns and prefer some camo pattern.
In case you care, both I and your mom are happy with my penis size.
Go home, Dad. You're drunk.