Thingiverse taking it's last breath?

I know, it's a bit of a clickbaity title. But I had to come up with something. They apply a quick fix for server-side issues, and now they introduced an even way worse bug because they did a quick untested fix... It's basically already unusable for a long time, and it's only getting worse.

Suddenly users are having designs in their 'designs' list on their profile showing up that are not theirs. In my case it's a some fetish-related object that I didn't make which is quite annoying because I do not want to be affiliated with these kind of things on thingiverse. This is pretty serious.

Anyone else having problems? The design that I did make two days ago seems to be lost in space. It was a remix from a ring. Weirdly enough, Cults3D pulled the correct design from thingiverse before it disappeared.

In here: [www.thingiverse.com]
This item shows up: [www.thingiverse.com]

Which clearly isn't made by me. Now I have found a few people with similar issues and tweeted to Thingiverse about this (how else would you approach them...?).

It can happen that people are having some designs switched over, but in this case it's meant to be some sexy object for a game. I want it to be gone a.s.a.p. The original file will probably never come back.

Here is the Cults3D backup that was made correctly:
[cults3d.com]

Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 07/24/2020 06:07PM by Ohmarinus.

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http://www.marinusdebeer.nl/

I look at the Designs I have on thingiverse and on my side it look like it is working.

Not missing any and do not have models I did not make.

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Computer Programmer / Electronics Technician

tried browsing directly to things recently?

You can't unless your logged in! All I get is a "Something went wrong."

I don't know if its wide spread or just a few things... gave up in disgust.

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Roberts_Clif
I look at the Designs I have on thingiverse and on my side it look like it is working.

Not missing any and do not have models I did not make.

It's only the things uploaded on July 22nd for as far as I can see. But there is no way to fix this as a user/owner of the design.

Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 07/25/2020 03:12AM by Ohmarinus.

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http://www.marinusdebeer.nl/

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Dust
tried browsing directly to things recently?

You can't unless your logged in! All I get is a "Something went wrong."

I don't know if its wide spread or just a few things... gave up in disgust.

Yeah, it forgets you're logged in and also sometimes doesn't register your login. They tried fixing the login problems but literally everything got even worse. Not to mention the new design is still terrible and some pages still use the old layout so it's a mess.

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http://www.marinusdebeer.nl/

It's not in a good state of health - it's a crying shame as the old website just worked. It did its job, was nicely laid out, and showed a range of featured designs and new items on the front page.

I recently tried to load a customizable design but the end result was just horrible and unusable. It was really simple too, with few variables.

I am now getting far better service on Cults3d, which is a shame as I did like the old Thingiverse.

Those that the gods would destroy they first make mad
Those that the organisation would destroy they first make bad

Mike

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leadinglights
Those that the gods would destroy they first make mad
Those that the organisation would destroy they first make bad

Mike

Exactly, it's a shame because when you take over a platform that thousands of people use daily, you also take over a certain responsibility.

Cults3D is doing a really good job of slurping all the content from Thingiverse. I hope the transition will be smooth. I'm going to leave thingiverse alone from now on. I have already coined the term 'palliative care' for Thingiverse, they responded to that one by saying it's not true, but we can all see that it's already rejected and only maintained on a really low level.

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http://www.marinusdebeer.nl/

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Ohmarinus
I have already coined the term 'palliative care' for Thingiverse, they responded to that one by saying it's not true, but we can all see that it's already rejected and only maintained on a really low level.

The cancer of human commoditisation is spreading to TV. Hence the need for people to be logged in to be identifiable.

The designers who are the source of TV's value are also now commodities to extract wealth from. For example, my "My Designs" list (which thankfully doesn't include anyone else's designs as per the OP) now includes an advertisement on each screen.

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frankvdh

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Ohmarinus
I have already coined the term 'palliative care' for Thingiverse, they responded to that one by saying it's not true, but we can all see that it's already rejected and only maintained on a really low level.

The cancer of human commoditisation is spreading to TV. Hence the need for people to be logged in to be identifiable.

The designers who are the source of TV's value are also now commodities to extract wealth from. For example, my "My Designs" list (which thankfully doesn't include anyone else's designs as per the OP) now includes an advertisement on each screen.

Yeah I noticed they now place ads in between objects. I honestly do not have a problem with it, because it is a free service and I do understand they need to make the website supply it's own money for maintenance. Running a site like this can get expensive since it's basically a filesharing service from which literally anyone can download. Traffic = expensive. However I am pretty sure that if they add the option to donate, people will donate because the website has been providing a lot of useful designs and they fulfill a huge and important role in the 3D-printing business. Always have been and 'always' will.

I love thingiverse for it's role in this hobby/business and I still remember seeing it for the first time when I just started on art academy. Nobody I knew had a 3D-printer so I bought an insanely overpriced DIY kit with every part missing, which eventually cost me over 1k to build because no shops had parts available at the time. Thingiverse was the place to go, every time it was a dopamine rush experience. Finding the latest Wades extruder mod, herringbone fanatics, someone explaining how to make your own hobbed gear from an M8 bolt. 'Those were the days' for me. Most of the parts on the DIY kit I bought were crap so I had to redesign every part myself and print it on the wonkiest printer ever. It didn't even had hardened rods, they were soft steel rods!

Most people who get into 3D-printing do not realize nor appreciate how much work has gotten into the rise of 3D-printing as a hobby. I know countless people who just buy a Creality and then simply download everything to upgrade it and print that. After that they print 5 different models they find on thingiverse and after that the machine just starts collecting dust in a corner. There are only three people out of all the people that I know that own a 3D-printer, that actually design and print their own parts and use these parts in daily life. I will not judge how people use their machine, but it saddens me to see how a lot of people just buy their way into it with cheap machines and see it as a commodity to put some fun planter on their window sill and call it a day. A machine is so much more than just a toy. An old fellow student of mine bought an Ultimaker 2 but doesn't want to invest any time into finding out how such a machine works. The result is that the machine just sits there and is considered a bad buy, but who is the culprit here? A little effort seems to be too much for a lot of people.

Thingiverse has played a major role in archiving designs and bringing people together. Letting them remix each others design, reference it, and this way things have been free to evolve. Inspiring makers, turning thinkers into makers and giving creative thinking people an option to develop their practice without using their hands too much. Ever since Thingiverse/Makerbot was taken over by another company I feel it's been abandoned. Thingiverse hasn't replied to my messages nor tags on Twitter, despite some people having serious problems with their profiles. I guess they pay some person to look at it only once every two weeks or so. There is no passion in running the site, everything that happens with it makes it feel as if they are a child who is forced to eat something they really don't like the taste of. I bet they didn't even hire someone to work on the code who had worked on it before, they probably hired someone new and cheap to try and fix certain site problems, because causing so many issues after applying a 'fix' would never have happened if they let someone work on it who already knew a thing or two about the website and it's code.

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http://www.marinusdebeer.nl/

Ohmarinus, you are right in so many ways - I think that's why so many people (including myself) are frustrated by the recent changes. They took something that appeared to be working (I can't speak for behind the scenes) and, basically, they made it unusable.

I do wonder if there's an element of pride and/or stubbornness in continuing with the new site layout - "we put a lot of effort into it and it cost a lot of money, so we're not going to admit defeat and reload the old website" - or words to that effect. I have seen that justification so many times during my career in software development... and it wasn't the right choice at any time!

But I have no problem with discrete and unobtrusive advertising on a website if it means that it can continue.

So very sad...

Edited 2 time(s). Last edit at 07/30/2020 08:41AM by David J.

They had just to improve the performance, not change everything to make it more "pleasant" ????
They failed !
Typical when look is more important than functionality.

Also, the pioneers were knowledgeable in technology but over the years the level went down the drain and most designs related to 3D printer build, parts,"improvements" are now junk, yet "popular" as they look nice, being over-complicated, using fancy parts most of them being cheap junk.

Pretty sure, that all the published junk overloaded the system.

Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 07/30/2020 12:44PM by MKSA.

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"A comical prototype doesn't mean a dumb idea is possible" (Thunderf00t)

... it's the same with recent "behaviour" in pretty all forums and groups, I'm part of ... most of the original quality is "totally overloaded" by sheer quantity or thousands of questions, which were already thousandfold answered ... or could be solved by simply reading back for more than only the last 10 or 20 posts

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Viktor
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Aufruf zum Projekt "Müll-freie Meere" - [reprap.org] -- Deutsche Facebook-Gruppe - [www.facebook.com]

Call for the project "garbage-free seas" - [reprap.org]

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MKSA
They had just to improve the performance, not change everything to make it more "pleasant" ????
They failed !
Typical when look is more important than functionality.

Also, the pioneers were knowledgeable in technology but over the years the level went down the drain and most designs related to 3D printer build, parts,"improvements" are now junk, yet "popular" as they look nice, being over-complicated, using fancy parts most of them being cheap junk.

Pretty sure, that all the published junk overloaded the system.

I believe the changes to the site were out of necessity for the owners. They had to find a way to get rid of contest announcements and of course removing the 'featured' items from the front page means that even less people have to maintain the site now.

When going to thingiverse now it sometimes takes over 20 seconds to even load the page. Nobody knows what's going on, but I have read multiple occasions of people missing designs, seeing the wrong designs in their own 'my designs' page and simply still not being able to log in.

Let's hope it gets fixed soon.

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VDX
... it's the same with recent "behaviour" in pretty all forums and groups, I'm part of ... most of the original quality is "totally overloaded" by sheer quantity or thousands of questions, which were already thousandfold answered ... or could be solved by simply reading back for more than only the last 10 or 20 posts

I agree, however I do have to admit that I sometimes feel like asking a lot of dumb questons myself that I sometimes could've taken a bit more time to examine. However, yesterday I had an issue with a stepper motor not moving correctly, turned out the cable had one loose connection but I couldn't see it from the outside. I was so proud that I came up with a novel way to find and fix this error without going on the forums or screaming at BigTreeTech that they sold me a non-working board

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http://www.marinusdebeer.nl/

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Ohmarinus
...

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VDX
... it's the same with recent "behaviour" in pretty all forums and groups, I'm part of ... most of the original quality is "totally overloaded" by sheer quantity or thousands of questions, which were already thousandfold answered ... or could be solved by simply reading back for more than only the last 10 or 20 posts

I agree, however I do have to admit that I sometimes feel like asking a lot of dumb questons myself that I sometimes could've taken a bit more time to examine. However, yesterday I had an issue with a stepper motor not moving correctly, turned out the cable had one loose connection but I couldn't see it from the outside. I was so proud that I came up with a novel way to find and fix this error without going on the forums or screaming at BigTreeTech that they sold me a non-working board

... yes! - sometimes the motivation has to grow on its own

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Viktor
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Aufruf zum Projekt "Müll-freie Meere" - [reprap.org] -- Deutsche Facebook-Gruppe - [www.facebook.com]

Call for the project "garbage-free seas" - [reprap.org]

There are clear cases of asking questions that have been answered many many times in the history of the forum; but having said that, I don't think that the problem is entirely with the noobs. The combination of really poor search tools in most forums, documentation (wikis, etc.) that are so outdated as to be nearly useless. In the forum some answers to oft-repeated questions so brief as to be of no use - in the days when most of the old-timers were learning, the even-older-timers would go out of their way to give accurate and comprehensible answers.

As Viktor says, sometimes the motivation has to grow on its own. The motivation will frequently be stillborn if the information is not there - if even the helpful phrase RTFM is hollow because the FM is not there to R.

Mike

Thingieverse has had performance issues for years, yet it continues to be the go-to. Yes you have to filter through a bunch of barely functional designs that seen to be more concerned with aesthetics than performance. But I've yet to find a better alternative.

I design all of my printer parts. It was a motivation if mine from day one after I got my first used printer. Did it cost me more? Yes. Did I learn a lot, by both doing and reading this forum/wiki? Absolutely. Did I make crappy designs? Failure is one of the best teachers!

Anyway, there's plenty of ways to look at 3dp and how the hobby has evolved. As it gains more popularity there will be fewer pioneers to innovate by comparison.

Just my take/observations.

If they want to attempt to save Thingverse maybe they should require login, like grabcad, it can't be good to not know who is downloading your stuff...even if DL's dont always translate to little tokens of appreciation like a stupid heart or thumbs up, where else will the brain get those endorphins?

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MechaBits
If they want to attempt to save Thingverse maybe they should require login, like grabcad, it can't be good to not know who is downloading your stuff...even if DL's dont always translate to little tokens of appreciation like a stupid heart or thumbs up, where else will the brain get those endorphins?

You are so right. It is things like this that make sure a community gets safer. I think it should even be mandatory for the creator to be able to see who downloaded their work. And the rating system that is only be available to people who actually uploaded a 'make' of the object. And then being able to use a search sorted on the 'Maker rating'.

So many good ideas....

Btw, the challenges page still exists:
[www.thingiverse.com]

Sadly nothing since over a year.

Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 08/01/2020 11:47AM by Ohmarinus.

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http://www.marinusdebeer.nl/

I see that Thingiverse now has an ongoing problem with "search" - it's been broken for a couple of days... the site is even less usable now...

Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 09/03/2020 11:01AM by David J.

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Thingiverse
After scheduled maintenance yesterday, Thingiverse is experiencing issues with search. Our engineers are investigating now. Please try again later.

The engineers have obviously tried Ctrl-Alt-Del dozens of times and even tried switching it off and on again

I think it is just not a priority - and maybe never will be again

Mike

I wonder whether Makerbot realise that savvy people will take this company's lack of commitment to the website into account when considering the purchase of a new 3d printer.

(probably not)

Right now I cannot view any model when logged in. I have to log out and only then can I view an object. Also, I am not able to add items to collections. It's all becoming so tedious.

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http://www.marinusdebeer.nl/

Now you can't download if you have an ad blocker enabled.... this is the final straw for me.. will be removing my models shortly.

Maybe they are just trying to get the site to be more like their printers

No one buys their printers except for public libraries and schools at this point, and usually even these customers have very little technical knowledge about 3D printing--they are apt to think that they are getting better quality because they are spending more money.

I noticed the ad block thing yesterday. It was a nag, not a block, but it admittedly angered me too. I've simply stopped publishing new models. If I want to share something, I'll host it on github.

This is strange because yesterday I downloaded quite a few models for my Hictop 3DP11/12 and I had ABP on the entire time and had no problems.
I was also successful in my searching for everything I was looking without missing a beat,

I search Thingiverse all the time, and yesterday I found models that supposedly were posted in 2018 for the very first time,
And I thought to myself where did this come from, it was not here the last time I searched for Hictop Models using this search descriptor.

Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 09/04/2020 11:00AM by Roberts_Clif.

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Computer Programmer / Electronics Technician

I am not having any problems with Thingiverse at all. I have always thought that their search engine was drek, I would need to try several different kinds of search-foo before I found what I was looking for. Kind of like searching Amazon.

DLC

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Kits: Folgertech Kossel 2020 upgraded E3Dv6, Anet A8 upgraded E3Dv6, Tevo Tarantula enhanced parts and dual-head, TronXY X5SA Pro(E3DHemera).
Scratch: Large bed Cartesian, exchangeable heads, Linear slide Delta, Maker-Beam XL Micro Delta, 220x220CoreXY.

Re tried today

If you have ABP and click the "download all" button of a thing the download never starts if you using chrome.
If you download just one file, this is still allowed.
Tied while not logged in and while logged in, it made no difference.

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Dust
Re tried today

If you have ABP and click the "download all" button of a thing the download never starts if you using chrome.
If you download just one file, this is still allowed.
Tied while not logged in and while logged in, it made no difference.

I have had that happen on occasion with Firefox too.

DLC