The size of the [3-D printing] market ... is expected to grow to $3.8 billion this year and soar to $16.2 billion globally by 2018. [...]
"This is a market with enormous growth potential now that the main barriers to up-take are being addressed," Shepherd said. "As it matures, there is clear and substantial potential across numerous sectors, such as engineering and architecture, aerospace and defense, and medical ... for 3-D printing to have a dramatic impact within five years."
— The Los Angeles Times
30 Comments
This is awesome *IF* the most common material used in the printers stops being plastic and becomes something biodegradable or 100% reusable. Plastic never, ever goes away. If everyone is printing tons of plastic off their kitchen tables we will be in deep environmental trouble PDQ.
they're probably trying donna. you can use PLA, which as i understand is a biodgradable plant oil based plastic rather than ABS, which is oil. however, the PLA has a lower melting and may not be best suited for all applications.
here is some greenwashing from stratasys if you would like more information:
http://pubs.acs.org/doi/abs/10.1021/sc400093k
That's only the tip of the iceberg. Imagine what can be done with this technology plus 50 years of advancement in nanotechnology and 50 years advancement in computer technology (maybe even quantum computing). The implications can be a game changer. It could forever erase the need for centralized manufacturing and the entire infrastructure that supports it. It's conceivable that one day ever store or living room can be a micro factory. You order an item and its fabricated on site in mins. It could also undo a lot of the dependency on foreign outsourcing. Of course the negative will be job loss, but the environmental benefits could be huge.
and meanwhile - Toyota is replacing robots with humans, because they've found that "master craftspeople" are far more efficient.
Great link, toast. This is exactly what should be happening everywhere.
3D printing is an interesting tech that like many others is far from mature or even useful and is being promoted for purely economic reasons. If a real analysis of the economics was done - including environmental and social costs - it would be discarded so fast it would make your head spin.
really miles? you can't see beyond all the over-rated 'this will change everything' rhetoric to see the beneficial applications of what 3-d printing actually is and actually does?
i'm pretty sure 3d-printing won't be discarded, even after sincere analysis. i'm pretty sure it will be used where it's beneficial, even if that means it won't print a pizza from pizza hut so you don't have to wait for the delivery person.
Did anyone read this article? Pretty spot-on take of the 3D printing fantasy.
http://www.slate.com/articles/technology/technology/2014/03/solidoodle_4_testing_the_home_3_d_printer.html
"If “customizable, personal designs” is part of your answer, remember that those designs will be limited to plastic, and that any use of wood or metal or suede will require additional procurement and assemblage, which means speed and convenience are out the window. There were very sound reasons behind society’s transition to centralized manufacturing"
I think it's going to be used mostly for one-off specialty components (mostly small stuff) - things where it's too precise/tedious to be done by hand, but not enough is needed to scale up to full production.
in terms of building components, I think one-off ornate stuff is going to become more "affordable" - I think it'll more likely usher in a new baroque era - where you have skilled 3D artists working in arch offices doing gargoyles and friezes. What's the point of using a 3D printer if you aren't going to do something super intricate? those 3D printed houses we've seen around here could have just as easily been done by conventional formwork. People are probably going to want their houses to look like this.
it'll take a huge ideological shift within arch schools for that to happen, though. you know, because some old austrian dude declared that ornament was crime or some nonsense and it's been passed down like it's one of the 10 architectural commandments.
There are very sound reasons for societies' transformation to decentralized manufacturing as well. Namely - jobs. If the name of the game is high production with automation - the masses need access to that in order to compete.
You guys seem to forget what the world looked like 100 years ago. Technology advances very very quickly. In 100 years from now it will be a completely different world. 3-d printing is not limited to plastic. Scientists have successfully used the technology to print a liver. Organs can be printed because of the properties of the cell. Nano technology can and will produce materials that can be printed and that can self assemble to some degree. It's not scifi its already in the making. To denounce the potential of 3-dprinting based on its current potential is illogical. I think too many people confuse ideology with reality. I'm not saying that this is good or bad, but Id bet anything that the technology will continue to advance. I'm 100% certain that we are not at the pinnacle of technology. That's a fact not a theory. We are not even a type 1 civilization yet. So regardless of our ideology, for the better or worse, technology will advance. The question is whether or not we will progress. That's a whole different can of worms.
Exactly. This technology used to manufacture actual usable domestic goods for end consumers - utensils, appliances, clothing - in any material other than plastic will be questionable due to the environmental and social (jobs) costs.
But used to print hearts or other medical aids: awesome. Bring it on.
Did anyone see Antiviral? In the movie they use celebrity muscle cells to print steaks, so you can eat your favorite celebrity. Great social criticism, there - and doesn't seem so far outside of possibility.
I was talking to a rep from Rhino a few weeks back and he was teaching a workshop in Mexico City to 3rd graders on parametric modeling with grasshopper. Not only did they pick it up quicker than college-level students, their output after a short time was far more experimental (product of youthful curiosity). If an 8 year old can pick up software that directly exports to 3d printers imagine what those kids will be capable of creating as 3d printing takes off. That makes me excited to see where it goes.
As someone with their own in-home printer, I love the convenience and creative outlet. I wanted a new iPhone case, so I made it. And yes, I've printed my own domestic goods...cups, forks, spoons, chop sticks, bowls, vases, lampshades, etc.
Like jla-x said, the future will be very different and that includes the labor market. 3d printing and at-home manufacturing is hardly what we should be worried about. Artificial intelligence will lead to the redundancy of far more jobs.
toasterover,
loved the article, especially this part:
"The car maker’s program also follows a philosophy of human capital similar to one outlined by George Mason professor Tyler Cowen, who argues in his book “Average is Over” that the jobs and gains in the economy of the future are going to go to people who can work with and improve smarter and smarter machines."
The title of the article is misleading. Toyota is still interested in industrial processes, they are hoping for intelligent humans to make these processes more efficient and increase the craft of production.
toasteroven,
"those 3D printed houses we've seen around here could have just as easily been done by conventional formwork."
Spot on, there needs to be an emphasis on projects that use digital fabrication for an applicable means, not simply for the novelty of it.
I wonder if anyone has done toxicity testing on the plastic used for 3D printing, or for the fumes emitted when the stuff is processed. I certainly wouldn't want to eat / wear / breathe anything produced this way.
Good point miles. It's probably not healthy to use for forks. The melting point must be kinda low? which means that it probably breaks down easily if hot liquids or foods are in contact. Ill stick with glass and steel for now.
they have information on that
http://www.stratasys.com/materials/material-safety-data-sheets
"I'm 100% certain that we are not at the pinnacle of technology. That's a fact not a theory. We are not even a type 1 civilization yet. So regardless of our ideology, for the better or worse, technology will advance. The question is whether or not we will progress. That's a whole different can of worms."
It's interesting that you conflate technology with civilization at first and then pull them apart. This is some of the confusion in this debate, whether these new technologies will be a net positive or negative. Personally, I think getting a woman president will augur progress more so than the next gadget, but I agree with Donna that this technology will certainly have its place. I think it's unrealistic that 7 billion people will have these mini-factories of plastic forks in their homes cranking out all sorts of what nots. Becasue our organic composition will always be at odds with these gee-wiz plastics, I just don't see it happening at a large scale. They will still be ripping down mountains and burrying tons of toxic waste in all this plastic industrialized process. If the earth were a body, it would be in serious need of detox, yet we can't even agree on whether ornament is good or bad. We have a long way to go.
I just want to be clear about my thoughts on this: the 3D digital technology is coming whether we like it or not. I am *sincerely* deeply hoping that we can consider the environmental impact of too much plastic as the revolution progresses. We humans should be smarter than we've been about it so far.
There are lots of parallels that could be drawn here, but let it suffice to say that all the trumpeting of huge $ in a new industry is exactly the same as any television commercial. Dozens of forces are playing this for profit without concern for you or the environment or anything else.
It's not that technology is bad per se, it is that it is bad to exploit every microscopic advancement in technology for purely economic reasons. When the other effects are purposefully ignored we get the photo Donna posted, which is in fact representative of large portions of the planet.
Rather than making more plastic shit we should be laser focused on dealing with the mountains of plastic shit we already have and continue to make more of every day. Among other things ...
I just don't get what problem 3D printing solves. Just creates more problems.
If you want to usher in a new Baroque era, the manipulation of light into graphics, digital interaction or even laser printing and cutting is much more interesting and modern.
You can say that about any technology. It sounds more like you don't care about what 3D printers allows. You're also only focusing on architectural 3D printing and ignoring applications in medicine, aerospace, food, etc.
There are a lot of potential benefits in 3D printing beyond the plastic garbage that gets printed in architectural offices around the world.
Thayer, the first female president will not amount to any more progress than the first black president did.
I made it clear that technological advancement and progress are completely different. Civilizations can advance technologically and do the opposite with regards to progress. It's possible to have an Elysium type situation. The term type 1 civilization is from the Karsashev scale that measures the hypothetical technological level of civilizations throughout the universe. We are a type zero civilization according to the scale.
You are dismissing my point based upon your ideology. I personally think that technology will have overall destructive social consequences for the masses, but that does not mean that it will stop advancing. What we want and what will be are two completely different things. This is the problem that I have with gung ho urbanization folks. They refuse to recognize the obvious trends because some of these trends threaten their overall philosophy.
Your right jla-x. Half of the world's population seeing a person of their gender be the leader of the most porweful nation in the world will just be a foot note. Let's send in the marines!
As for the split in technological advancment vs. progress, I acknowleged that you did separate them, but that it's confusing for some people, so you might want to re-read.
And what is my ideology? That I'm pro-urbanization? Imagine an architect liking cities...
"What we want and what will be are two completely different things." Well, if you know what will be, then I'm all ears (eyeballs), but I do want this planet to start healing itself, and I know wanting that to happen is the first step towards achieving it, whether it happens or not. If I see a trend for fascism, that will only motivate me to fight it, not to accept it happening.
I said it won't amount to any more progress than the first black president. Didn't say zero for all. Just wont stop the ice caps from melting or begin to slow the widening rich poor gap. Unless its someone awesome with big fuckin balls (or big fuckin ovaries).
Again, I like cities too. I love cities actually, but that does not mean that all urban development or urban beautification will render net positive effects. Gentrification for instance. It also does not mean that the city itself is an absolute perfect and ultimate form of human habitation. We are a very primitive species. Who's to say that the city is not just a temporary phase of our evolution. I could be wrong, but I see the westernized city losing its ability to sustain the majority of the population because of reasons I've pointed out on that other thread.
I dont know what will be exactly, but I do know that technology will advance because that is obvious. It advances every day. I also have enough knowledge of history to be able to see that human work is being replaced by machine work since the beginning of time. That trend is speeding up exponentially. I also know that human greed will likely win over altruism because I have no reason to believe otherwise looking at history and the present state of things.
Fascism, yes I agree on that 100%. It is a problem that threatens us all. I think technology will probably push us further towards fascism because of the huge gap it will create between rich and poor. A gap even much bigger than we have now. Robotics will make many/most jobs obsolete.
Progress should be defined by improvement in the human condition, which includes health, food and care of the environment - not by financial return on technology. "Progress" has eradicated millennia of human knowledge, mostly because it stands in the way of profit.
getting a woman president will augur progress
Any woman president will have to prove she has more balls than the previous president. Which shouldn't be difficult, as BO's balls are made out of pussy.
The shortsightedness and frankly ignorance towards this technology in this conversation is stunning. Enabling individuals to generate their own solutions to everyday issues is bad? Like they won't continue to develop truly biodegradable consumables? Owners of printers don't know what consumables are food safe? Providing people with a means to understand even the absolute basics of the design/fabrication process is bad?
How about instead of the average american driving 20 miles each way in their SUV with the AC cranked to Walmart to pick up a plastic item manufactured in China and shipped to anywhere USA they could instead fabricate it in their own home...Worried about too much plastic crap, seriously? "Reusable" consumables are not far off...
The advances in medicine alone are ground-breaking. Organ printing is going to continue to save lives. Contemporary print heads actually have to be scaled back to a lower resolution for successful medical printing.
LIT, I agree!
There are so many applications currently and will be so many more as the technology advances. I do think, and Im just being hypothetical, if pushed to the limits where we could literally print at a molecular level it will be a game changer...It will have more impact than the industrial revolution did imo which will have both positive and negative consequences.
LITS - using these tools requires knowledge of (or even interest in) 3D software - and I think the vast majority of people out there simply don't care. I think it's going to have a much greater impact in cottage industries, medicine, design, science, (maybe even disaster relief), etc... I think for most regular consumers who want some specialty items will probably just go to a shop and get some help in making stuff... but for more utilitarian objects, why would you even bother using this technology? if you're at the point where you desperately need to 3D print a fork or a cup, you have other problems.
The whole reason 3D printers exist is to provide a faster and more convenient way for users of 3D software to make physical models. It WILL significantly impact many industries, but I don't see how these things will ever get beyond the DIY home enthusiast in terms of personal home use.
toast's point is well made. Let's add that the 'raw' material has to come from somewhere, so that whether it's a product or printer media being shipped from China makes no difference. And people will still drive to WalMart to get it.
Unless of course they starting piping it into houses like water. Or maybe we could use human waste as the media, killing two birds with one stone.
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