Stratasys wants a closed eco system for their printers. I guess MakerBot might not be very open for very long since Stratasys bought it.
http://3dprint.com/77101/taylor-swift-3d-printing/
The evidence is the 5th generation Makerbot Replicator with closed hardware and software that has been on the market for over a year.
Taylor Swift is a non-entity to me. Not good, not bad. A popular artist that has done a fantastic job with her economic enterprise.
The idea of not being able to use your tools you paid for with the consumables you want seems odd. Think of not being allowed to use a saw or hammer without ‘vendor approved and supplied’ wood and nails, that may be good quality but only available in limited quantity at inflated prices.
Swift does provide a product that people want, and she and RSA (or whatever the music industry enforcement body is) have stacked the deck in their flavor.
Apple has decided to be a service provider in the industry that is highly regulated (especially by public opinion), so is required to some extent to play by the pre-agreed on rules. Apple is big, but not enough to fight both the legal and public opinion issues simultaneously while trying to kickstart a new business venture that has no current track record. Being pragmatic, Apple buckled this time.
There is more hyperbole than substance in that piece and using gratuitous Swift references in such a non sequiter manner reinforces this. Swift’s issue was not getting paid at all for the three months her work was to be used during the promotional period. Not even close to being the same thing. The comparisons and conclusions are poorly formed and ill conceived.
Stratsys want to get DMCA protected lock in for materials. While Jaglom says Makerbot doesn’t plan to do it, the piece is sort sighted as potentially any sort of decision could have further reaching implications than with 3D printers. That is using copyright protection as a means to enforce restrictions on hardware.
Instead of chumming the water with click-bait for forums(something 3Dprint.com does a great deal), a better use of the medium would be to educate people on what do to become involved by explaining what if any public comment periods were available. Even if no comment period was available what means could be taken to help enact change or get ones opinon heard. For example letting people know orgs like EFF support open platforms for 3D printing and are very involved with issues concerning the DMCA (as a whole, not necessarily specific to this material lock in deal). https://www.eff.org/deeplinks/2012/10/join-effs-efforts-keep-3d-printing-open
By stoking the fire it brings out the vocal minority that negatively impact the preception of the community to more reasonable, rational thinkers. We need pragmatisim and reason. Not yelling and hand waving.
If I bought a Prius and decided to dismantle it, change the pistons, batteries, ECU, etc… Toyota wouldn’t give a shit! They already got my money. They would also be quite happy that I had effectively shredded any warranty, which can be a large secondary cost to OEMs.
So… Why does Stratasys care what I do with my printer? They want to use government to force us into buying more stuff/services from them. This is equivalent to Toyota saying that their customers should be forced to buy OEM parts, oil, tires, fuel, and so on… Seems like a ridiculous business plan to me!
@Matthew_Satterlee The DMCA prevents you from reverse engineering any protected software component on your Prius. In addition to the copyrights on that software that would prevent you (legally, anyway) from using it in a manner not intended or granted in the license, the DMCA forbids you to even have a look at the software if it requires circumventing access control. In practice that could be as easy as a password. You absolutely have to use a Toyota mandated capable part to run your Prius software right now. If you started a company to clone the battery management system using reverse engineered Toyota software, even if it didn’t violate a patent, they could (and likely would) crush the company like a bug.
As more things become software and interface driven, the use of the DMCA could impact you far more than having to use Stratasys material cartridges on your six figure cost Projet. It’s already that way with your Prius.
There is a huge difference between software copyright enforcement or patent enforcement and what constitutes either of them. DRM/DMCA is a whole other ball of wax and so is tampering with emissions controls… Even so, my analogy wasn’t meant to be air tight. It was meant to show that what Stratasys is trying to do is terrible for their customers… That anyone outside of a corporate boardroom would support this attempt to shaft consumers is beyond me.
@Matthew_Satterlee Stratasys isn’t trying to get DMCA protection for material lock in, under current law they have it. What’s happening is last year Public Knowledge submitted what is called a “1201” exemption for 3D printing software to be exempt from the DMCA. Currently 3D printing software falls under the DMCA and is not exempt. What Stratasys and others have submitted in the comments opposing the motion is what is being discussed. Several of the 3D pubs lead people to assume that Stratasys is trying to gain additional rights when in fact they have had this right all along. They are trying to defend that right so they can still use DRM enabled firmware to enforce a material lock in. https://www.publicknowledge.org/issues/detail/anticircumvention
We’ve missed the comments period so what we need to do is be more heads up when things like this happen so we can weigh in.
Da Vinci 3D printer was/is? selling printers commercially at a reasonable price, but they had DRM chip in their non-refillable ‘filament cartridges’ that were more expensive for weight than the non-DRM filament. Da Vinci did do some trying to force folks to use only DRM filament. I don’t know what the status is, but I did see some ‘how to defeat’ the DRM chip or reset the chips videos/articles.
I agree, if we don’t stay vigilant, we will fall on occasion into the clutches. The best way I have seen so far is to vote with your $$ and just don’t purchase the solutions you don’t like. The Keurig users did, and won. We can too if se stay vigilant.
the comparison between 3D printers and in jet printers is wrong. the input on 2s is ink and paper the output is ink on paper and water you choose to print. 3D printers input is plastic and any design you can imagine. the output is plastic in the shape of that design. hmm who deserves the protection of copyright. surely the person who designs the output on paper or plastic.
This article is so full of it. this is not about protecting rights, its about a companies ability to bend its customers over the chair on the purchase of consumables. As if stratasys are the only ones to ever put effort into refining the materials that get used. this is pure selfish greed, nothing more noble.
If you don’t agree with statasys - DON’T buy their products. PERIOD>
I don’t agree that I Should be able to buy a commodity and use it in their printer
Imagine if Tire makers insisted on using ONLY a can of their air with a patented valve to refill their tires - Same - damn thought process. / theory here. .
I will protect my $$$
-_- your can’t really compare cars and printers.
if everyone decides to jailbreak there cars and then Toyota’s start randomly crashing, guess who is gonna be blamed… Toyota. so it makes sense for Toyota wanting there cars closed source. and it’s there right as a company to do so. also there are open source cars the Rally fighter for example is open source . and if that’s not good enough fro you build a hot rod. And regarding chipped filament. when you buy a printer, if you’ve done an ounce of research you will know weather it chipped or not.and if your not happy with that buy a reprap. and if company want to sell a printers at a discounted price and make there money back later with filament that there choice. also why is everyone complaining about Taylor swift… none of us has even met her… however Stratasys stealing open sourced design from the community is just wrong.