Frezik

The software is where most of the magic happens. How do you control steppers and ink output otherwise?

There’s some projects out there for those.

I don’t think we’ll have open source 2d printers. Not the way they’re built now, anyway.

On first glance, it might look like 2d is an easier problem than 3d. However, laying down plastic filament doesn’t need the same precision level as 2d ink/toner printing. Even 300dpi is far more precise than any 3d printer does, and that’s not particularly impressive for a modern 2d printer.

That’s not even getting into mixing and aligning color cartridges.

The industry also has a lot of patents around it. So there’s that whole mess to deal with.

Framework looked at making their own 2d printer, and they noped right out.

Would you accept a printer that works like a typewriter with arms that strike the page to lay down text? That might work. They’re mechanically quite complex, though. There’s lots of OK designs that tend to jam up.

Damn it, not all bi people are greedy horn dogs.

I mean, I am, but not all of us are.

Also, “you live in a basement”. I mean, it’s technically true. I spend a lot of time in my office that happens to be in a basement of a house I own.

Well, the bank owns most of it, but the point stands.

Some people clearly aren’t even trying.

FWIW, the major makerspace in my area–or what was the major makerspace–was a lot like that. A couple of people didn’t like that and started a new one, with myself and my wife coming on board almost right away. It took a long time and I’m not sure our story can be easily replicated, but we’re now the bigger of the two in terms of space and membership size.

But like I said, Covid was a brick wall for our social aspects.

I’ve found makerspaces to be a secular alternative. The makerspace has to specifically foster community, though. There’s quite a few that are just techbros with a clique that you ain’t in.

Covid also killed a lot of the social aspects of my makerspace, and it’s been hard to build it back.

I’ve heard (from people who have credentials in this stuff) that the people in the room at the time were mostly orbital mechanics people. The planetary scientists weren’t there. That’s why you have this “cleared its orbit” rule. If there were more planetary science people in the room, Pluto might still be considered a planet. And it may yet change back.

My skin has never felt so open.

Neat, so it’s like nature’s own little Conway’s Game of Life.

What about the guy who wears a Spirit Holloween “Dr Feelgood” lab coat?

Ok, yes, I see your point.

In a more general way, other creatures don’t experience taste the same way we do.

Bird poop is really nutritious to seeds. It makes sense for those plants to be eaten by birds (with the seed passing through the digestive tract untouched), but avoid other creatures.

Enter capcasin. Mammals find it intolerable (except for one subset of a goofy bipedal species), but birds love that shit.

It’s “more secure” because there’s a specific company to blame when it goes wrong.

This is what happens when old men don’t take up model railroading.