Alternatives to "FDM"?

As Forrest mentions here: [forums.reprap.org] , Stratasys would prefer we didn't use "FDM" to describe the process RepRap uses to build objects. We could just call it RepRapping but that's a bit self-referential. I'm thinking something like:

DTF - deposited thermoplastic fabrication
EMM - extruded material manufacturing
ALF - additive layered fabrication

Any other suggestions?

I guess it'd be a stretch to come up with something that spelled out ADRIAN.

Quoting Adrian from some time back...

Let's just use the expanded term "fused filament fabrication"
when we really need to, use "additive fabrication" at all other times
and avoid:

1. Capital letters, i.e. no "Fused Filament Fabrication"
2. Acronyms, i.e. no "FFF"

I think that that works just fine. No acronyms, just the brief descriptive phrase.

Bah! Where's the fun in that?

Wow... It'll take ages to write!

As for Steve's suggestions:

DTF - deposited thermoplastic fabrication: I like it better as a replacement for the "forbidden word" as it doesn't specify that we have to use a filament. Maybe somewhere in teh future there will be other extruder designs that use pellets or whatever?

EMM - extruded material manufacturing - Even more general than the previous. I like generalizations

ALF - additive layered fabrication - Waaa, completely encompassing!! My alltime favourite!

I think fused filament fabrication is the only one specific enough to describe the process we are using at the moment. Not sure why Adrian objects to it being shortened to FFF.

---

[www.hydraraptor.blogspot.com]

I really dissagree. FDM is a type of rapid prototyping, just like SLS, SLA, LOM, EBM. People often use the term "bandaid" refering to an adhesive bandage and the BandAid company doesn't have their panties in a twist, and that's actually using the company name (this seems to be done more in America, same thing with Jello for gelatin).
Just because they commercialized the FDM technology doesn't mean that they own the term. Imagine if goodyear told everyone the term "tire" could only be used on their products. Or if you needed to be Scottish to use the term "golf" instead of some other term.
The definition of fused deposition modeling ( [en.wikipedia.org] ) is exactly what is being done here, so why not. The reprap project is given a decet section on the page too.
If the reason for this problem is that Stratasys doesn't like it, then I laugh at them and their conceited thought process (maybe they're scared we'll take all their money away in later years).
On the other hand, This project has also thought of being used as CNC, laser cutting and sinistering and even UV curing, then I do agree that a new term should be used, but to emcompass all of the possibilies not just thermoplastic, extrusion, or additive.

As soon as I read that first post I made an assumption, I know I shouldn't have, but I was right. They are an American company, big surprise. Don't get me wrong, I live in America and it can be a great place, but I'm not American. I have, however, lived here long enough for this "politically correct" BS to get under my skin.

I have an idea. If they have a problem with anyone using the term that refers to the same type of system they use, then THEY should change their terms. How about "Stratasystem" if they made it. We can use a term that describes the current reprap system of fusing a substance by depositing it on a base to make a model. How about something like fused deposition modeling or FDM for short. LOL. ridiculous.


(OK I know I sound pissed off here, but I think some of you see my point and I'm sorry for going on a rant.)

~Dylan

Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 06/26/2008 05:20AM by Dylan.

I know acronyms can be off putting but they are often more successful when searching than a phrase. There downside is that they are often used with multiple meanings all of which will be returned unless a further search term is used.

Below are the results of searching, via goggle, for "fused deposition modelling" and "rapid prototyping" as phrases and acronyms in order of number of 'hits' found. I've removed any searches where the first page of results were not all relevant.

fdm rp - 206,000 hits
fdm "rapid prototyping" - 108,000
"Fused Deposition Modelling" "rapid prototyping" - 19,500 hits
"Fused Deposition Modelling" - 11,500 hits
"Fused Deposition Modelling" rp - 3,770 hits

Using an acronym required the use of a second term to limit the results to one interpretation of the acronym, although only "Fused Deposition Modelling" was unique enough to be used on it's own and it came 4th in terms of 'hits'.


reprap - 318,000 hits

For comparison I tried 'reprap', which got more hits than any of the previous searches and also nearly all of the hits were relevant. From this it would appear that the 'best' term would be a made-up/fusion word.

Anyone for 'FuFab'(491 existing hits) or 'FuseFab'(0 existing hits)?

Whatever we choose, we're doomed not be be as cool as CandyFab's 'SHASAM', which always entertains me.

Dylan Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------
> Just because they commercialized the FDM
> technology doesn't mean that they own the term.

Pay attention. They copyrighted the term. You may not agree that they should have been able to, but they can and they did, quite a few years ago at that.

> If the reason for this problem is that Stratasys
> doesn't like it, then I laugh at them and their
> conceited thought process (maybe they're scared
> we'll take all their money away in later years).

You can laugh all you want. You still can't use the term here to describe what we do.

> As soon as I read that first post I made an
> assumption, I know I shouldn't have, but I was
> right. They are an American company, big surprise.
> Don't get me wrong, I live in America and it can
> be a great place, but I'm not American. I have,
> however, lived here long enough for this
> "politically correct" BS to get under my skin.

It's not political correctness. It's copyright law. You may not like it. There are big chunks of it that I don't like either, though this isn't one of them. The only way to change it is either through Congress and the White House or through court rulings. I frankly have no faith in our corrupt Congress and I also don't have either the money or interest to pursue this kind of silly jihad through the courts.

> I have an idea. If they have a problem with anyone
> using the term that refers to the same type of
> system they use, then THEY should change their
> terms. How about "Stratasystem" if they made it.
> We can use a term that describes the current
> reprap system of fusing a substance by depositing
> it on a base to make a model. How about something
> like fused deposition modeling or FDM for short.
> LOL. ridiculous.
>
>
> (OK I know I sound pissed off here, but I think
> some of you see my point and I'm sorry for going
> on a rant.)
>
> ~Dylan

Okay Dylan, I'm going to put it to you flatly. Stratasys has asked the director of the Reprap Project to not use FDM to refer to what we do. Dr. Bowyer agreed. Our relations with Stratasys to this point have been cordial in that the request that we got was informal rather than the more usual cease and desist nastygram. We'd like to keep it that way.

The point is that if you want to be mad about that, fine. You won't, however, be allowed to pick a fight with the Stratasys people in Reprap blogs and fora and get everybody involved just because you don't like what they have a perfectly legal right to do. Have you got that?

Quote

People often use the term "bandaid" refering to an adhesive bandage and the BandAid company doesn't have their panties in a twist, and that's actually using the company name

That's because it is too late for them and their trademarks. Successful companies have often ended up having to fight very hard to protect their trademarks from 'genericide', whereby it becomes a generic term and anyone may use it as they wish. It ceases to have value to the company that worked so hard to get to the top of their market.

Xerox is another example, though presumably a US one as I'm not familiar with 'xeroxing' to mean photocopying. Googling is another one which is slowly rising to prominence. There are plenty more... [en.wikipedia.org]

Until the term becomes generalised, it remains their trademark.

And we don't want to annoy the trademark people, in case they come in all heavy handed.

Quote

maybe they're scared we'll take all their money away in later years.

'Later years' is a long way away, and they have an enormous lead on us. In the same way that building your own PC from bits, and throwing linux on it hasn't destroyed Dell or Microsoft; I don't see and home brew fabrication kits reaching the speed, precision and repeatability of commercial rapid prototype machines any time soon and so Stratasys et al will remain quite relevant for a long time yet.

And even if our project does take off and approach the quality of commercial machines, people will still buy these expensive systems because they can expect support. And if nothing else, because there won't be a danger that they've trodden on someone's patents by using an open source project which managed to piss off the patent holders and might attract suage in the future.

Just a thought.

While I agree with Forrest that as the director of the Reprap Project has made a decision, everyone should abide by it (at least on Reprap project property), I just wanted to clarify a few points:

1) you cannot copyright a term, they have a trademark. Trademark law and copyright law are substantially different, i.e trademarks don't expire.

2) it looks like the trademark only applies to 'FDM', not to 'fused deposition modelling'.

3) it's only registered in the US

More worthy of discussion is the fact that Stratasys have a whole raft of patents for FDM style technologies, so playing nice with them makes sense:

[www.google.com]

or

[www.google.com]

or

[www.google.com]

for example.

Lee

A better google search is
[www.google.com]

Which lists all patents assigned to Stratasys rather than all those that refer to Stratasys somewhere within them. It comes back with 52 patents, I've not checked if they are all different though.

And here is the legal info on "FDM" Trademark for any that care.

[tess2.uspto.gov]

And here is a second "FDM" Trademark item that is specific to what RepRap is and does.

[tess2.uspto.gov]

And that should put an end to this discussion about if we can use this term about the RepRap project.

Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 06/26/2008 10:57AM by Robert Teeter.

---

Bob Teeter
"What Box?"

It isn't actually the correct term for what we are doing anyway because we are not making models or prototypes, but actual finished items.

---

[www.hydraraptor.blogspot.com]

> And here is a second "FDM" Trademark item that is
> specific to what RepRap is and does.

I was just about to post this. Basically, it says that Stratasys has a trademark on "FDM" for "computer driven machine for making a physical embodiment of a graphic design by a material deposition process". There are other "FDM" trademarks out there but none are related to rapid prototyping. And, checking Stratsys' website, it looks like they have "TM" next to all occurrences of "FDM"

So, yes, anyone using "FDM" for anything remotely like Stratsys' prototyping process would probably find themselves in hot water.

I vote for fused filament formation as a term of art for what we do and an abbreviation of 3F.

We are after all fusing filaments to form things and while 3f generates lots of google hits they don't seem to be related to 3d printing on the first few pages.

I have to say that I don't understand Adrians' resistance to acronyms, they are fairly inevitable and mostly harmless.

Forest (et al) I agree with your comment on the political ways of the land and wouldn't even consider taking anything that far. I also didn't bother researching whether or not they had a copyright or patent on the term which is why I left that aspect off of my post. They may have a legal right to the term and would easily win in a legal battle which "we" don't need. The reprap project is open source so I could go do whatever I wanted with my part of the project, but there are those accountable for the direction of the project or at least the site and organization name so there is a good political reason to "play nice" (not to mention good business ethics). I didn't think they would have bothered trying to get any international patent or copyright so in all fairness if we base this project off the fact that Adrian started it in the UK then there might be fair grounds for discussion, but that's up to him and it's probably easier not to bother.
I'm stubborn and speak my mind. I plan on using whatever term I want when talking about how this machine works when talking to friends, family, and interested parties, but I don't want to hurt the team or project and whatever is decided upon by the core team should be (and I would use) on the wiki, forums, and any official event as to not make any problems.

I still stick with my thought though, that we should describe the machines usage in all forms of what it will be. Even if all we do is the additive extrusion production (usable term for a final product machine?) and circuit boards, that'll be two types of production. I am thinking of closing the whole thing off and putting an ambient heating element in there and using the pellet dust support material method just like the commercial units (if I go that far) this way it would be even less like FDM machines.

anyway, that's just my 2 cents (twice over, lol)

~Dylan

There is nothing wrong with stubbornness. If especially Adrian Bowyer and the core team in general hadn't been stubborn there would have never been a Darwin in the first place. I don't think there is any concern at Reprap whatsoever in how you refer to what you are doing in your personal life or even in your own blogging. Mind, if you get to be well-enough known, you might attract Stratasys' attention all by yourself.

When I used to be a real stroppy guy, possibly a bit like yourself, a professor I used to work for a LONG time ago gave me an excellent piece of advice, viz, "Pick your fights VERY carefully and make sure that you don't get too many going at the same time."

Conflict takes energy that's better spent on creativity.

A.D.R.I.A.N

Automatic Deposition Robot Infrastructure And Neonate

Neonate is a "newly born child".

What did I win?

I fear that we may end up drowning in Contrived Reprap Acronym Proliferation...

How about---
Reprap Enhanced Production by Repetitive Application of Plastic

I vote for the acronym in Ru's last post

Replicating Extruded Prototyping, Rapid Additive Plastic?

Tim and BDolge both used REPRAP, but this already stands for something. If we can't use anything on this page as rapid prototyping technology (2/3 down the page [en.wikipedia.org]) then if we're coming up with something just for this project, we may as well use REPRAP. Then when people search for how it works they'll come across the wiki and see all they need to.
Or just leave the method as RP (rapid prototyping). If we're talking to someone or have it written as FDM and expect the other person or people to know what we're talking about then they should know how some of the RP systems work.

Tim and BDolge both used REPRAP, but this already stands for something. If we can't use anything on this page as rapid prototyping technology (2/3 down the page [en.wikipedia.org]) then if we're coming up with something just for this project, we may as well use REPRAP. Then when people search for how it works they'll come across the wiki and see all they need to.
Or just leave the method as RP (rapid prototyping). If we're talking to someone or have it written as FDM and expect the other person or people to know what we're talking about then they should know how some of the RP systems work.

~Dylan


(woohoo my 100th post).

There is a reason behind this, my understanding is that if a term is a recognized "generic" term for something it can't be copyrighted, at least in the US. Since we are a non-profit group talking on an internet forum they couldnt stop us from using the term if they wanted to, all they can do is ask.

They are asking because if we do continue to use the term as a generic then they will have a much harder time defending the copyright if someone does infringe on it.

Mike

ohiomike Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------
> There is a reason behind this, my understanding is
> that if a term is a recognized "generic" term for
> something it can't be copyrighted, at least in the
> US.

Trademarked, not copyrighted. I misspoke when I talked about copyrighted earlier.

> Since we are a non-profit group talking on an
> internet forum they couldnt stop us from using the
> term if they wanted to, all they can do is ask.

No, you are wrong in this. They would have been within their rights to send us a formal cease and desist order. That is the usual practice in such circumstances. If we had refused to comply they could have filed suit against us.

> They are asking because if we do continue to use
> the term as a generic then they will have a much
> harder time defending the copyright if someone
> does infringe on it.

They "asked" as opposed to sending a "cease and desist" notice because a few people in the firm had spoken with several of the core team members on a few occasions. On the impression that these few had of us they convinced the rest that they might achieve the same effect as a cease and desist order informally and avoid the heat and bad feelings that cease and desist orders are wont to create.

Their forbearance in this regard is much appreciated. If Stratasys had been the Mouse (Disney), for instance, things would have gone very differently and much more unpleasantly.

As I said earlier, this was a small thing for them to ask and Dr. Bowyer was more than happy to give them what they asked for. While we can't stop you all from violating the understanding that we have with Stratasys outside of these blogs and forums be certain that we will enforce Dr. Bowyer's undertaking with Stratasys within them.

I'd personally appreciate it if you all didn't antagonise the people at Stratasys. Nothing is to be gained by doing so and a considerable amount of good will is likely to be lost. We have a good working relationship with them and would would like to keep it that way.

Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 07/02/2008 05:34PM by Forrest Higgs.

Quote

There is a reason behind this, my understanding is that if a term is a recognized "generic" term for something it can't be copyrighted, at least in the US. Since we are a non-profit group talking on an internet forum they couldnt stop us from using the term if they wanted to, all they can do is ask.

Quote


No. If the terms was recognised as generic _before_ they applied for the trademark, then yes, there would be a case for revocation of the trademark. I don't know if that's the case here or not, and I am not sure how tested 'prior art' for trademarks is.

If the general populace continues to use a registered trademark, it can become 'diluted' (think coke or McDonalds or starbucks), if the dilution is recognised, the scope of the trademark becomes even broader, and covers _all_ uses, not just the original industry.

So if a clothing company trademarks FDM for something to do with clothes, they can (in fact they have), and its all perfectly legal. If a trademark becomes diluted, such as coke, then if another company tries to use coke, even if it has nothing to do with beverages, I.e. computers, they are in violation and will find themselves losing in court quick smart.

Lee

What I'd like is some sort of mash-up between an acronym generator and onelook's reverse dictionary [www.onelook.com] .

The result would be a subject-specific acronym generator. You give it an acronym and a few concept words and it expands the acronym using words related to the concept.