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by nickpinkston 4907 days ago
With all respect, I think your's is the "maker idealist" position on this movement. There are many reasons why economies of scale (which are due to physics / engineering problems) will continue to exist in manufacturing - even if many methods are democratized and available locally (a la TechShop today).

I've written on this recently: http://www.nickpinkston.com/2013/01/some-thoughts-on-digital...
2 comments
hosh 4903 days ago
Ok. I'm not expecting distributed manufacturing to come over night or even in the near term. I'm aware that it requires crossing over a threshold before that happens.

However, I think it is worth developing these technologies with that in mind. The landscape may change faster than we think.

So I don't think it is "idealist" in the sense that, "well, in the real world, this just isn't practical or possible."

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nickpinkston 4896 days ago
Yea, I think you're right on landscape changing fast. There are definitely bottlenecks that could be opened if the right discoveries were made in material science, etc.
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hosh 4903 days ago
Interesting. I'll take a look at that.
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