Betcha didn’t expect a stealth lesson about the Engineering process, did ya?
I wanted to provide the files for the arm mounted 3D printer project, but unfortunately the specific battery backup I used is no longer available, meaning any attempt at it would involve a redesign of at least half of it. So as much as I’d like to usher in the future of arm mounted 3D printing cyborgs, I’m afraid that future will have to wait.
In returning to this project, I found I had to reeducate myself on how the Easy Threed K7 worked. They made that machine so unintuitive that if you ever misplace the manual, you are done. It’s definitely in the “it Works” category, and it was perfect for this sillyness. But there’s a reason I don’t make a habit of using the K7 regularly.
However, PrintABloks print acceptably on it.
I was really pleased with the Baby Belt Fight animatic in this video. I cracked these pictures out in an hour, colored them in a few minutes in photoshop, and yet, I feel it conveys the story pretty well. I mean, yeah, it looks like crap, but that’s part for this channel.
It feels like it’s been a long time since I posted… mostly because it has. I started off this month strong, but then I took a week off to go on vacation (not the campting trip I reported on in this video, by the way) and when I got back Stratasys was suing BambuLabs over some patent violations that were ridiculous on the face of it. I worked on a video on the subject and even discussed it on my discord, but I never felt good about the angle I wanted to take. My initial take was that we as the community could dismantle Stratasys’ patents, and defang not just this suit, but all future suits from Stratasys in the future. However, to a business their patents are assets, and I wasn’t sure how Stratasys would (or could) react if I made myself the face of devaluing their business. I eventually decided to pass along my notes to BambuLabs and let their lawyers handle it. But then I thought about it, and realized they won’t. Because BambuLabs is also a business who deals in patents themselves. Now, what follows is pure supposition, but I think patents are the sunset plan for a business. When the well has run dry, when the company has nothing left to give and is merely a shell of their former selves, as Stratasys is now, those patents provide occasional boosts of income to the company by shaking down the new kids who are eating their lunch. And BambuLabs doesn’t want to shake their boat because then they lose their sunset plan.
What bugs me about this, though, is that Stratasys’ patent, especially the ones they’re using here, should have never been granted. What bugs me even more is that Stratasys probably wouldn’t have sued Bambulabs if they weren’t in the patent game themselves. A lot of people are wondering why they don’t sue Prusa. Well maybe it’s because Prusa would actually dismantle their patents because they don’t play that game.
Business. Yuk.
