What Will Ubiquitous 3D Printing Do To IP Laws? 347
Lucas123 writes "With scanners able turn objects into printable files and peer-to-peer file sharing sites able to distribute product schematics, 3D printing could make intellectual property laws impossible or impractical to enforce. At the Inside 3D Printing Conference in San Jose this week, industry experts compared the rise of 3D printing to digital music and Napster. Private equity consultant Peer Munck noted that once users start sharing CAD files with product designs, manufacturers may be forced to find legal and legislative avenues to prevent infringement. But, he also pointed out that it's nearly impossible to keep consumers from printing whatever they want in the privacy of their homes. IP attorney John Hornick said, 'Everything will change when you can make anything. Future sales may be of designs and not products.'"
It may cause problems like Xerox (Score:4, Informative)
Put it in perspective (Score:4, Informative)
Take a look at the patents. And take a look at the stuff around you. How much of the stuff around you is patented and amenable to being 3d printed? And what fraction do you believe you could put together cheaper and more conveniently?
Let's take a look at a stapler. $5 from Amazon. I'm sure it was patented at one time. Let's pretend it still is. Even with the best 3-d printing today, using million dollar machines, you're not going to be able to make a good one. So let's assume the machines get good enough and cheap enough you could make a stapler at home. How about the staples? Ok fine, let's assume you can make those too.
You want to go through the trouble of making the parts and assembling? Oh, you've got a cheap machine that can make it from multiple materials and even does some of the post processing?
Congratulations. It's 2050 and you've made a stapler that could be bought for $5 in 2013 from Amazon. And now Amazon has it for $1 because they own a better machine that runs 24/7 and buys more varieties of materials at lower cost. And the patent ran out decades ago.
Next up, a microwave oven. Or car tire. Or tv remote.
3D printing is going to be a problem for only a very few items. Not the vast majority of stuff you use or is patented. Economies of scale will make even those items impractical to knock off. It'll be decades before it becomes even a miniscule problem. Why are we getting in a tizzy now worrying about it?
Re:Impractical? (Score:5, Informative)
On a side note, BMW is increasing its use of 3d printers to print out parts due to complexity or ticks that can be done with 3d printers. In the 3d market manufactures is one of the fastest growing categories.
http://www.economist.com/news/technology-quarterly/21584447-digital-manufacturing-there-lot-hype-around-3d-printing-it-fast [economist.com]
Re:there is a precedent for that (Score:4, Informative)
Unless alcohol sales US are suffering terribly from the advent of home brewing, the statement of this lawyer is a bag full of sh*t aimed at creating legislature that will only benefit IP lawyers.
I agree with you, and I don't really think that brewing beer at home will ever really threaten the industry. After all, you want a cold beer now, not next month . . . Also, I don't need another hobby and I'm lazy.
However, (some, many?) states actually do have some fairly strict (and odd) laws governing brewing beer at home. Alabama and Mississippi lifted their total bans on the practice just this year. California lets you brew 100 gallons per house, 200 if more than one 21+ year old lives there. You can take it to contests but not sell it. A license is not required. In Iowa, you can bottle beer and remove it from the home to give away, but not charge for it. Actual brewing is not specifically allowed. In Kentucky, you can't give it away or sell it, but you can take it to a bar for a beer judging competition. In New York, you can maybe make beer at home, but certainly not sell it. Possession of homemade beer is not specifically prohibited as an illicit substance. It's a pretty bizarre and tangled web of laws.
Re:Impractical? (Score:3, Informative)
My car has little plastic thingies which spray water on the headlights. Due to snow and ice, they are broken. Replacement parts at the dealer cost $110 each (for a part which can't contain more than $1 worth of plastic).
I'd love to download and print replacements.
It may be $1 worth of plastic, but if this specific part fails on, say 0.3% of the cars that use that it, you are looking at a nationwide market of a few hundred units per year. The injection mold for that part cost $15K. Restarting a production run costs $3K to set up before you even get first part off the line, so you produce years worth of inventory in one run. That inventory needs to be stocked, tracked, and distributed...and that's only one "little plastic thingie" out of hundreds that can break on your car. You need warehouses to hold them all.
Did it really cost $109 to get that $1 piece of plastic into your hands at the right place at the right time? No. In reality, it only cost about $85. Your dealer pocketed the difference. Would your dealer LOVE to be able to print that part onsite. Yes. It would save everybody shitloads of money.
Re:Impractical? (Score:5, Informative)
Saying that BMW is printing out parts is stretching what they are actually doing. They are printing out tools, jigs, and fixtures that are used in the assembly process. If they used a block of wood to spread the force out of a jack during assembly, you wouldn't say that the manufacturer was making wooden parts.