A silly idea. Formerly [A gentle request ]

Hey all.

Welcome to the new forum. I have no idea how this is going to work out, but no matter.

My one request for users of this forum is that you guys take a minute once in a while to design one thing that is cool and interesting, and upload it to the RepRap.org wiki/parts/arts/docs as a courtesy. Or to help out in other forums with user support. Which you folk do anyways.

Right now RBS looks cool, so we should try do upload and sort out gear families, rack and pinion, etc.
[objects.reprap.org]
but anything cool and interesting is good.

That's more a gentle suggestion, than a rule.

My job here is to make a space for you guys. But I urge you to give back to RepRap.org the best way you can, by contributing to the RepRap.org commons.

Now, here is your space. Please use it to make wealth for yourselves using RepRap.

Regards,
Sebastien Bailard
Seniormost Library Gnome and forum wrangler

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[EDIT: January 21, 2009, Evening. I've changed the title to "A silly idea". In the next day or so I'll move this discussion, which has generated useful points and analysis, to Library Administration and Announcements where it belongs.] -

Edited 7 time(s). Last edit at 01/21/2010 11:39PM by SebastienBailard.

So any person that tries to sell anything in the For sale forum must produce 1 orgininal design and post it to the RepRap.org commons?

If it is "less than a gentle suggestion" does that mean you will in some way punish someone who does not follow your commandment?

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repraplogphase.blogspot.com

(spacexula is referring to a slight more stern version of the request above, edited to make it clear that it's a request.)

Nah. Too much work. And I'm not malicious or a twit.

I have to figure out if running a marketplace helps RepRap more than it hurts. I'd say it helps. But forum administration cuts into my research time, and my play time, and it doesn't seem like people very rarely create new pages without prompting on the wiki, or upload anything. Except for JAGS, about two days ago.

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Frankly, you guys in this market place are building the infrastructure, you are the infrastructure to get RepRaps out there, and I'm not going to harass or slow down this part of the community, because it will hurt RepRap.org more than it helps.

But, if you guys want to work on designing a Braille Printer, or in some other way contribute to the commons that RepRap.org hosts, uploading files, projects, etc. is a very good way to do so.

Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 01/21/2010 04:58PM by SebastienBailard.

[blog.makerbot.com]

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[www.hydraraptor.blogspot.com]

Ah. I rather wish the RepRap website could host that stuff too. We need to make it better first.

Thank you nophead.

Sebastian, this sounds bad, but as of late you have sounded almost jealous of Makerbot/Thingiverse. It's just different.

Sort of like the Salvation Army being jealous of the US Marine Corp.

RepRap is an open source uberella organization for a style of device that defies profit. RepRap, and this forum will be around WAY after Makerbot and BfB goes away.

Makerbot is a temporary RepStrap company that will go away some time in the next decade. If you own a Makerbot/Mcwire/repstrap/Mendel/Darwin/Rapman, would you EVER let your brother buy a Makerbot or Rapman? NO! You would let them borrow your printer while you are at work (Like I have for the last few weeks).

As far as Thingiverse, it's a GREAT site. I would much prefer RepRap spend it's efforts in a direction that can not/ will not be covered by a small company like Makerbot.

-Promotion of other Rep Strap companies, (especially in Europe and Asia)
-Promotion of distributed manufacture of RepRap components
-Promote replication (which all the RepStrap communities profit by NOT promoting)
-Promote improvement of the core RepRap designes, possible promoting a forked design structure for the RepRap desings (1 for production rate, 1 for ease of assembly)

As I see it now this comminuty can go 1 of 3 directions:

-Several medium sized fully Open source companies like makerbot helping seed a larger RepRap community that will evidentially surpass them.

-Many very small personal bussiness (like what we see in this forum) that are basicly 1 family producing products as a side bussiness (Makergear, Ultimachine, Makerbot to a point, the cnc croud, the molding crowd)

-Companies that decide to steal (or at the best game) the RepRap community for it's intellectual properties, while trying to maximize their profit short term, like Bits from Bytes.

The 1st two in my opinion are the better outcomes for the community, the final is my personal nightmare.


If you wish to feel anger at a company, point it at BfB, they are the leach of the community (Not the owners of th devices, but the owner of the company).

Who do you thinks makes more money in a year Makerbot or Bfb? Who gets more Google hits, who is the REAL enemy of RepRap.org.

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repraplogphase.blogspot.com

Is Thingiverse opensource? If it was you could create another instance on the RepRap server

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[www.hydraraptor.blogspot.com]

Sebastian, this sounds bad, but as of late you have sounded almost jealous of Makerbot/Thingiverse. It's just different.

It is a commingled of frustration, jealousy, and anger at how badly certain forking developers have 1) forked the community, 2) forked projects, 3) forked parts of the RepRap toolchain, 4) forked parts, 4) forked discussion, and 5) forked names. All of this while being exquisitely careful at creating pretty and functional websites deliberately not at reprap.org, seemingly or functionally in order to slice parts off of what RepRap is or what it should be, while heading RRRF.

This is mixed in with the frustration and joy of having to gently and persistently fuss at users to upload and create RepRap-related projects in the wiki.

And with frustration with small matters like not having a trusted non-profit ready to maintain the commons of things like 3D scans of 16th century sculptures. Yes, they can all be GPL, but it'd be good to know that trusted folk are running the place where they are all organized, presented, and uploaded. As opposed to a for-profit which can get sold to Microsoft or some other corp which has little interest in "the commons". Fifty years from now, this is going to be important.

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But I shouldn't stumble into this marketplace and threaten to tax it if people don't upload to the server. That's so fucking stupid I'm embarrassed, because I shouldn't scare people away from the website and thereby fork things up worse.

I'd wipe the thread out of mild shame, but I'm apparently a "Librarian" so censorship of other folks' words is not an option.

Also there is some decent discussion in the thread, so I'll move it over to "Library Admin and Announcements" in a day or so where people who care about how things run can discuss these matters if they care to.

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First, I'll get back to some twiki->mediawiki stuff, and then make some notes on my good idea: have people's left-hand-side forum icon and such include links to the RepRap.org pages that they're responsible for and proud of e.g. [[MisterBunny'sCarrotStraightener]], and a link to their homepage, e.g. [[MisterBunny.RepRap.org]]

That might actually work a bit.

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Thanks for being patient with me, guys.

Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 01/22/2010 12:03AM by SebastienBailard.

All this nonsense on my part is from being frustrated about a very basic thing for about half a year.

That is, having RepRap developers upload their work to sites off of RepRap.org.

After a lot of chasing my tail, whining, growling, bellowing, pleading, and fussing to get them to use the RepRap website, I realize that the solution to the othe problem is simple.

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1) We need to fix the website and then move their work back onto to it.

2) There's been a lot of silly discussion about who's a RepRap developer and who's not, and similar nonsense, much of it from me. But now it's finally occurred to me that everyone who agreed to use the GPL and contributes to RepRap.org is and always will be a RepRap developer, especially and notably my friends on the mailing list.

So I don't see any problems arising when we straighten out the RepRap.org website and starting cleaning up and archiving all the parts, arts, docs, and such like we scattered all over the place.

I'm locking this thread so that discussion can move to other subjects, or other folk can revisit this subject by starting new threads.

-Sebastien

Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 01/22/2010 05:41PM by SebastienBailard.