California's New Bill Requires DOJ-Approved 3D Printers That Report on Themselves (adafruit.com) 123
California's recently-proposed AB-2047 would require 3D printers sold in the state to be DOJ-approved models equipped with "firearm blocking technology," banning non-certified machines after 2029 and criminalizing efforts to bypass the software. Adafruit notes that unlike similar legislation proposed in Washington State and New York, California's version "adds a certification bureaucracy on top: state-approved algorithms, state-approved software control processes, state-approved printer models, quarterly list updates, and civil penalties up to $25,000 per violation." From the report: Assembly Member Bauer-Kahan introduced AB-2047, the "California Firearm Printing Prevention Act," on February 17th. The bill would ban the sale or transfer of any 3D printer in California unless it appears on a state-maintained roster of approved makes and models... certified by the Department of Justice as equipped with "firearm blocking technology." Manufacturers would need to submit attestations for every make and model. The DOJ would publish a list. If your printer isn't on the list by March 1, 2029, it can't be sold. In addition, knowingly disabling or circumventing the blocking software is a misdemeanor.
[...] As Michael Weinberg wrote after the New York and Washington proposals dropped⦠accurately identifying gun parts from geometry alone is incredibly hard, desktop printers lack the processing power to run this kind of analysis, and the open-source firmware that runs most machines makes any blocking requirement trivially easy to bypass. The Firearms Policy Coalition flagged AB-2047 on X, and the reactions tell you everything. Jon Lareau called it "stupidity on steroids," pointing out that a simple spring-shaped part has no way of revealing its intended use. The Foundry put it plainly: "Regulating general-purpose machines is another. AB-2047 would require 3D printers to run state-approved surveillance software and criminalize modifying your own hardware."
[...] As Michael Weinberg wrote after the New York and Washington proposals dropped⦠accurately identifying gun parts from geometry alone is incredibly hard, desktop printers lack the processing power to run this kind of analysis, and the open-source firmware that runs most machines makes any blocking requirement trivially easy to bypass. The Firearms Policy Coalition flagged AB-2047 on X, and the reactions tell you everything. Jon Lareau called it "stupidity on steroids," pointing out that a simple spring-shaped part has no way of revealing its intended use. The Foundry put it plainly: "Regulating general-purpose machines is another. AB-2047 would require 3D printers to run state-approved surveillance software and criminalize modifying your own hardware."
Fine (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:Fine (Score:4, Insightful)
And besides sooner or later somebody is going to use one of those ghost guns in a murder and it's going to get around and make the press and the public is going to demand action.
People freak out if you threaten to take their guns away. But they also freak out if the cops can't catch murderers easily. And easily producible untraceable guns that don't require a machine shop or something the public isn't going to allow.
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Try walking into a random machine shop and ask them to make you a receiver and let me know how that turns out for you.
Re:Fine (Score:4, Insightful)
Imagine going back in time and telling the founders that people would have to get permission from the government to make a gun.
Back in the modern world, there's nothing illegal in the US in making guns for personal use and many people do. This law is both idiotic and blatantly unconstitutional.
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They would have been fine with it. The second amendment guarantees states the right to form armed militias (or to put it in modern terms, armed police forces). It wasn't intended to give every individual the right to own guns for their own private use. That's a modern reinterpretation.
there's nothing illegal in the US in making guns for personal use
That's just completely false. Gun manufacturing is a highly regulated industry.
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The second amendment guarantees states the right to form armed militias
Exactly right. But they have to be armed when they are formed. The Constitution reserves the right to arm militias to the US Congress (typically the states National Guards). If the state wants an armed militia of any other type (police force) the only way they can be armed is as citizens.
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That said, I think the second amendment is definitely taken greatly out of context. We are honestly using the thoughts and ideas of people who lived 200 years ago to have the slightest idea what makes since in terms of things like state run militia. And we're also using their perspective on what makes sense when the entire population of the US was 2.5 in 1776. 2.
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The biggest relevant factor back then was that state militias were a huge part of the military capacity of the US. "A well regulated Militia, being necessary to the security of a free State", was absolutely true in the then-existing military structure. The militia structure still exists; it is now known as the National Guard. Also, back then, individuals were responsible for bringing their own weapons (and doing their own training); today, the National Guard itself provides the weapons and the training.
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The militia structure still exists; it is now known as the National Guard. Also, back then, individuals were responsible for bringing their own weapons (and doing their own training); today, the National Guard itself provides the weapons and the training.
Not really. Congress is empowered to arm the militias. They did so under the powers reserved to them by Article 1, Section 8 of the Constitution:
To provide for organizing, arming, and disciplining, the Militia, and for governing such Part of them as may be employed in the Service of the United States, reserving to the States respectively, the Appointment of the Officers, and the Authority of training the Militia according to the discipline prescribed by Congress;
The "such part" of the militias is known as the National Guard. But there are other militias, appointed by the states. These are now called police, sheriffs, park rangers, dog catchers, etc. Whatever a state wants. But the Constitution restricts the arming of militias to Congress. Not allowed for the states. So the only way a state can have armed cops is to hire ci
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The 2A only exists because of slavery. The southern states demanded the ability to raise their own army in case the actual army was off defending Boston when a slave uprising developed.
The 2A is the *only* one caveated and excused as if to say, well ok, we have to and here's some reasons.
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I think the second amendment is definitely taken greatly out of context. We are honestly using the thoughts and ideas of people who lived 200 years ago to have the slightest idea what makes since in terms of things like state run militia.
This is not directly contradictory but certainly has some dissonance, wouldn't you say? Your second sentence here suggests that it is not, in fact, taken out of context... you just believe it's archaic.
So, I think gun ownership should simply be highly regulated.
The people who lived 200 years ago left you a mechanism to achieve that (constitutional amendment, the same process they used to guarantee the right to keep and bear arms).
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So change the amendment then. What if we did a little search and replace on your comment?
That said, I think the first amendment is definitely taken greatly out of context. We are honestly using the thoughts and ideas of people who lived 200 years ago to have the slightest idea what makes sense in terms of things like state run press. And we're also using their perspective on what makes sense when the entire population of the US was 2.5 in 1776. 2.5 million people barely counts as a single city in 2026.
Look, I don't really love guns either, and I'm not married to gun ownership as a civil right. But as it stands, as both a matter of law and custom, it is one. I don't think we should get to wave it away with courts or simple majority laws, otherwise we put just about everything on the table.
Re:Fine (Score:5, Informative)
That's just completely false. Gun manufacturing is a highly regulated industry.
While some states do have restrictions, you do not need any sort of federal license for manufacturing for personal use. The ATF's own website even confirms such: "An individual may generally make a firearm for personal use."
It's only "heavily regulated" when you're doing it as a business.
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> Gun manufacturing is a highly regulated industry.
Manufacturing *for resale* is highly regulated.
Why is it your post is almost completely counterfactual from start to finish?
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The second amendment guarantees states the right to form armed militias (or to put it in modern terms, armed police forces).
This is thoroughly false. "[T]he right of the people to keep and bear arms shall not be infringed." The prefatory clause about the militia explains the motivation but does not recognize or protect anything on its own. "The people" have a First Amendment right to peaceably assemble; a Second Amendment right to keep and bear arms; a Fourth Amendment right to be secure in their persons, houses, papers and effects against unreasonable searches; and retain rights not granted to the federal government or reser
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That's a modern reinterpretation.
Uh, since when? Tell me when this was interpreted in any ther way by either SCOTUS or constitutional scholars at large?
SCOTUS ruling 140 years ago, Presser v. Illinois, 116 U.S. 252 (1886)
But in view of the fact that all citizens capable of bearing arms constitute the reserved military force of the national government as well as in view of its general powers, the states cannot prohibit the people from keeping and bearing arms so as to deprive the United States of their rightful resource for maintaining the public security.
The second amendment guarantees states the right to form armed militias
Yes, and where did those weapons come from that the state militias used?
...thirty thousand state and militia troops fighting for the American cause...
Patriots [NOT STATES] had begun to amass caches of weapons as tensions grew in the months leading up to the Battles of Lexington and Concord in 1775, seizing British arms from royal storehouses, provincial magazines and supply ships. At the beginning of the Revolution, the army relied on soldiers to bring weapons from home [NOT STATES], including hunting guns, militia arms and outdated martial weapons from the French and Indian War.
https://www.americanrevolution... [americanre...titute.org]
This is pretty cut and dry. The Constitution protects the rights of militias, as defined at the time when the Second Amendment was written. The notion of the militia, critical for the very existence of the United Stat
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See my reply to Zak3056. The case you cite is from almost a full century after the Bill of Rights was written. Earlier cases interpreted it differently.
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The second amendment guarantees states the right to form armed militias
The second amendment guarantees that the right of the people to keep and bear arms shall not be infringed. The purpose of that right is certainly because a well regulated militia is necessary to the security of a free state, but the right clearly belongs to the people and not the states (which do not have rights, but rather have powers). The power of the states to form militias is already articulated in Article I, Section 8.
It wasn't intended to give every individual the right to own guns for their own private use. That's a modern reinterpretation.
[citation needed]
The actual "modern reinterpretation" is that the second amendment
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Like much of the Bill of Rights, the second amendment is modeled after the Virginia Declaration of Rights [wikipedia.org]. It directly copies language from it: "a well regulated militia", "a free state". It didn't need to define what those terms meant. Everyone understood that when the second amendment used those words, they meant the same thing as in the Virginia Declaration of Rights.
Today not many people remember the Virginia Declaration of Rights. Instead they invent their own definitions to make the second amendme
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Can we stop with the fantasy that a 'well armed citizenry' will stand up to tyranny?
We're watching those most vocal about gun rights either being utterly silent on secret masked police running amok, or actively being part of said secret police.
Re:Fine (Score:5, Insightful)
Generally it is not illegal for you to rent time in a machine shop (in the United States) to produce a receiver (depending on various state laws.)
It is also generally not illegal in the United States (again, depending on various state laws) to run your own small scale ammunition press at home to make your own ammo. It is in fact, the only way for certain out-of production calibers to be produced these days, unless you want to commission a custom run. There are also people who design and produce their own custom derivations (known as wildcat cartridges), some of which have become later commercial successes in their own right. Other people hand-load in order to optimize the ballistics for a specific application (for better distance, accuracy, compatibility with a specific firearm build, etc.) To my knowledge, other than state laws restricting the sale of ammo (if they exist), and federal restrictions on caliber, as well as issues with liability and quality, there's no restriction of resale of handloaded ammo, as there is with a homebuilt gun produced for personal use.
Manufacturing a firearm without a license for sale is the regulation you are talking about.
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You don't need any permits to manufacture and sell ammunition.
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So never heard of hand loaded ammo?
No idea that folks routinely mill their own lowers in machine shops, and have for decades?
Why is it you just make stuff up?
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My guns and ammo are made in my shed. Zero regulation.
Plenty of machine shops will rent out a CNC machine. Bring your 0-80%, a jig, and the code, press start. I've made seven or eight receivers this way.
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Try going into a hardware store and buying a bit of pipe for your zip gun. Or to 'finish' your 3D printed pistol.
If you do not tell them, they know not what you are doing. It's just a piece of pipe.
OTOH, try asking around for a plan for a sheet metal, 'welded' AR-15 lower receiver. Then ask your local machine shop[ if they would cut these for ya. An afternoon of learning to stick weld and you are well on your way. Ask for two of every piece, so your first attempt need not delay you much.
The 2A world conside
Re:Fine (Score:4, Informative)
It has ALWAYS been perfectly legal for US citizens to make their own firearms.....no serial number required.
The catch is...you cannot sell them or give them away, personal use only.
Using a 3D printer or CNC machine that is user friendly is only using an old tool to do something that is 101% legal in the US and has been always.
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You don't need a machine shop. You can buy a small 3-axis CNC milling machine and lathe for a few thousand dollars. That plus some G-Code and you can already make untraceable guns that are much more capable than anything you can get out of a 3-d printer. You can do it even cheaper if you are handy with electronics.
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In most states you do NOT have to generate a serial number such firearms nor register them with anyone.....
Re: Fine (Score:3)
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The same argument that anyone who knows how to work metal can make a gun ignored that 3D printers are different. If they were not, they wouldn't be so desirable. The whole point is to make it easier, trivial even, to make things.
Star Trek understood it, and it's been stated that the replicators won't make weapons. We aren't quite at the "push a button, gun comes out" phase, but there is a line somewhere.
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That's still the case today..for your normal run of the mill plastic 3D printer...it's not going to just magically print a working firearm.
You will need some metal pieces....with 3D printing, you're generally just printing the lower which can be polymer (ala Glock)...but you need
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True, but we aren't that far off. Metal 3D printers exist and are coming down towards hobbyist reach. The range of materials available to hobbyists has increased a lot. There are also hobbyist CNC systems that are a lot easier to use than the industrial versions.
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True...but we aren't quite there for pushbutton.
That being said...I'm happy to see the progress being made.
Again, it's always been legal in the US federally (and most states too) to make your own firearms.....with no serialization, as long as you
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I'm not sure what the bill demands is even possible. Many vendors will just drop Ca like a hot potato, they're not that big compared to the rest of the world.
You can still build a practical 3D printer from an Arduino with a stepper control board. That's not going away, and that's not going to run the crazy theoretical magic gun parts detector.
The problem of ghost guns isn't so much 3D printing as it is CNC machining. No sane person is going to fire a fully 3D printed gun.
I guess Californians will just have
Re: Fine (Score:2)
In this case, pretty sure theyâ(TM)re overstepping by so much that instead, *no one* will comply with the California standard, and California will just not have 3D printers.
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California is too big of a market. Everyone will just conform to the California standard.
The California standard is completely and utterly infeasible. It fails Goodhart's law, which states that as soon as a measure becomes a target, it ceases to be a good measure.
As soon as you say "A part that looks like this arbitrary gun part cannot be manufactured", it's open season on designing a new version of the part that doesn't trip the rule. And as soon as the government adapts to that new design, five minutes later, there's another new design that still doesn't trip the rule.
It's a game of cat and
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Anyway, my current plan is to figure out whether my assembly member voted for this trash, and if so, pledge the maximum dollar amount to the campaigns of every person running against that person in the next election. If everyone reading this post did the same, these shit-for-brains-stupid laws wouldn't keep getting passed.
And as I read this, I realize that the bill hasn't passed yet. So consider this a pledge that if my assembly member does vote for it, I will support his or her opponents, without regard to their positions on any issues, simply because almost anyone would be better than someone clueless enough about technology to vote for a law like this.
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3D printed ghost guns are less common than firearms made from simple construction materials you can get at any big box hardware store.
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3D printed ghost guns are less common than firearms made from simple construction materials you can get at any big box hardware store.
The one that killed the former japanese prime minister was entirely handmade, all of it, even the powder and ignition system.
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Do they? Because the last time the President suggested it, along with people from the DHS, the best the NRA could muster was a "it was a bad idea to bring a gun". The only group that called everyone out was a local gun owners group who emphasized he was carrying legally and properly and it was his right to bring it to a protest.
As far as I can tell, those people "going nuts" kept quiet when the President suggested not having guns. Kept silent when DH
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NRA is not the only US 2A rights organization, it's not even the most effective. GOA for example defending Pretti's "right to bear arms while protesting", as did the SAF [saf.org] and many others
Do they? Because the last time the President suggested it, along with people from the DHS, the best the NRA could muster was a "it was a bad idea to bring a gun".
Odd, that's not what the NRA stated [x.com], nor what any media org reported [pbs.org] them as saying. So where do you get that so-called "quote"?
Trump was the one who said "it was a bad idea to bring a gun", and here is the NRA's actual response to trump's suggestion: “The NRA unequivocally believes that all law-abiding citizens have [x.com]
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Or download your OctaPrint firmware outside of the US. Or delete any silly reporting or AI nonsense that someone tries to add to the firmware you want to use.
"stupidity-on-steroids dept" (Score:2)
What else should one expect from all these red states?
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Today I learned that the states proposing these insane 3D printer bans, California, Washington, and New York - some of the most rabidly liberal states in the US - are, in fact, "red states".
I mean, if you mean USSR red, then... yeah.
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From your prescient assessment it would seem that the country formerly known as the USA has boiled down to just two shades of red, USSR-red and ruzzkie-pederation-red.
Congratulations, I guess.
Super Soaker 50 Trigger (Score:3, Insightful)
How is this software going to know you're not repairing a water gun?
California causes cancer.
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Quick education in guns:
The receiver is whatever the ATF says it is. In some cases, the frame is the receiver (for example a revolver, or a traditionally manufactured pistol). In other cases, the metal rails that nest in the interchangeable plastic frame are the receiver.
A trigger is typically not considered part of the receiver. However, there's nothing in the proposed law that says that the trigger shall be excluded from consideration as part of an overall algorithm to prevent printing of "a firearm."
h [ca.gov]
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You continue to make things up. The "issue" (completely legal, and not in any way connected to reality) is which part is the serialzed component. This actually varies depending on the firearm.
You consistently seem so sure of yourself.
criminalize useing NON HP INK pass that bill now!! (Score:2)
criminalize useing NON HP INK pass that bill now!!
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Real Problems Vs. Fake Problems (Score:5, Insightful)
Real problem:
Mass displacement of white collar workers underway. A lot of careers outside of the white collar world require training and certification, with barriers to licensing (outside of exams) such as minimum number of hours worked before qualifying to sit for an exam. Unemployment hasn't been adjusted to keep up with inflation. Things are not great.
Fake problem:
3D printers could be used to make unapproved machines at home. Better tax people to create a bureaucracy dedicated to keeping people from potentially causing a non-existent public threat. Best case - security theater. Worst case - camel under the nose to start regulating computing devices as well. After all, computers could be used to *gasp* share machine drawings for people to manufacture gun parts without a 3D printer!
Also, g-code is used not just for additive manufacturing, but also for things like routers and mills. If you regulate all software capable of generating g-code for a 3D printer, you're also directly regulating all computing platforms used in those industries. Open source project to generate g-code for a cricut? Could be used as a circumvention device, BANNED. Open source project to build a CNC mill requires a slicer - which now is illegal to run without a government subscription and yearly licensing fee in California. Effectively BANNED.
Great, there goes the in-state manufacturing industry. I guess we'll just have to ship all our work out of state, and those jobs too...
Plea for sanity:
This really feels like rearranging deck chairs on the Titanic for the sake of "doing something". Invent a problem that doesn't exist, and then spend money making it go away. Can we please start laying off politicians instead? Or identifying the lobbyists that are pushing for this so we can rightly tar and feather them before this spreads any further?
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BTW, folks from other states might not understand, this kind of insanity is standard in California (introduce invasive laws that make no sense) due to the fact that our legislature is FULL TIME.
Yes, we pay them (and their staffs) for 365 days of work (minus vacation and holidays). And this is what they give us.
https://ballotpedia.org/States... [ballotpedia.org]
"As of 2017, full-time legislatures generally had larger staffs than other legislatures. A few exceptions to this rule were Florida and Texas, whose hybrid legislatur
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3D printers could be used to make unapproved machines at home.
Unapproved?! I think you are mistaken. I can build all of the guns I want at home perfectly legally. I can't sell them, but I can create them.
There is something else going on here. I do not know what it is, but it is NOT gun control. Guns are perfectly legal to create at home.
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They do this instead of dealing with the homeless crisis, drug crisis, housing crisis, etc.
We can't get these jokers to do rent control or block foreign real estate speculation. So they keep trying to put GPS in our electric cars to tax us, or put vague requirements to control theoretically dangerous technology that is simply not a primary problem in this state right now.
Hopefully, solitary idiots (Score:2)
Given that this is a new bill, it may not even make it out of committee. Sadly, there are people who elect idiots who engage in performative legislation. Whether that be anti-abortion legislation that was automatically unconstitutional until recently, or things like this. There are people who don't think. There are even worse attempts in history, like the move to legislatively define PI.
I mean, most of us here recognize that trying to have 3D printers recognize "gun parts" is a bit like trying to have c
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Homelessness is also a bad policy. Really messes with your economy when you have potential labor that isn't able to participate. And have retirees that suddenly get priced out of their homes due to their fixed income. And massive market collusion from landlord services. Frankly, I'm not going to accept some hand waive "economists" say in order to accept that the current underregulated state is the best that things can get.
Not a handwave (Score:2)
Yes, homelessness is a bad thing. How is rent control supposed to eliminate it though? It tends to result in LESS housing available, which is the problem.
As for "handwave", you mistake me considering it mostly off-topic, and thus summarizing, not that I was "handwaving" it. Consider that I did mention that there are "other ways" to help keep rent prices and speculation under control. That makes your "current underregulated state" missing the target, because I already said that the current state sucks -
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1. Insufficient opportunities for graft.
2. Insufficient opportunities for graft.
3. Insufficient opportunities for graft.
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1. "The Public" are idiots.
2. How does "being traceable" somehow reduce crime? I seem to remember a study some years ago which found very few crime guns were traced because it either couldn't be done or there was no benefit to doing it.
"Tracing" is just another argument for registration, which is another word for confiscation.
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Literally all objects (not just firearms, or even "weapons", however you wish to define it) "can be used in crime". Where do you get this stuff from?
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"tracability" of a weapon to *solve a crime* is pure movie/TV nonsense.
You've been watching too many tv shows with poorly lit (in dim blue light) high tech forensics labs featuring zoom/enhance.
Not a gun nut! (Score:5, Insightful)
I'm back. Just as I thought. A very nice person with good intentions who is also a lawyer. So yeah, no clue. She does seem to have something against plastics in general.
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Road to hell. Check.
Good intentions. Check.
At this point I'd want to know what the estimate is for establishing and funding the CA DOJ apparatus to regulate 3D printers in the state, and the impact it would case on professional and hobbyist markets through:
1. Regulatory compliance. There are a number of pistols that are not sold in California because California has its own set of safety certifications that manufacturers have to get that effectively act as a ban on sales in the state (hint, it's an effec
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Sacramento wants to disarm every Californian. Would be a shame if a tyrant were to show up one of these days and steal elections, end our democratic processes, and overthrow 250 years of Constitutional government.
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Re: Not a gun nut! (Score:1)
No no you're clearly mistaken. According to science, only right-coded policies can possibly have downsides and any left-coded policy is self-evidently an unalloyed good.
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Re:Not a gun nut! (Score:4, Insightful)
Just make 3D printed guns illegal. Put people in prison if they are found with one when they commit a crime. Oh wait. IT'S ALREADY ILLEGAL. We already seize these guns by the thousands.
People have made hundreds of thousands of ghost guns in California before 3D printing was even viable. Both through the legal loop hole for 80% receivers and after that loophole was mostly plugged in California. It's too easy to do with shit you can get at harbor freight and a little practice and patience. And once one guy in the neighborhood gets the hang of it, he's inviting his buddies over to "teach" them how to do it as well. You end up with like 30-40 guns from one dude. With random serial numbers scrawled on them. (at least back when it was legal to make them here)
In California there might be 1500-2000 murders in a year, and in the same year the cops will seize around 10,000 guns without known manufacturer recorders. Some are guns with the serial numbers removed, many of them are home built in some capacity. Cops certainly don't like that there are so many armed people here, but the cops, the government, and the media like to scare us common people into thinking each of these guns is a killer. Yet the statistics show that these guns aren't really the causes for most of society's problems.
Should we not have so many unregistered firearms in the hands of people committing crimes? Obviously we shouldn't. But should we try to regulate into extinction something that is perhaps impossible to completely eliminate, while simultaneously ignoring a hundred other problems in society that we can address if we put our mind to it?
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I'm no gun nut, nor do I worship at the feet of the second amendment, but this seems downright stupid. I'm betting this Bauer-Kahan person, although well intentioned, is probably not really well informed on this. I'll go do a little research.
I'm living in a country with very strict gun control laws, and I think this is downright stupid.
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Virginia is in the process of banning guns that can't be detected by a metal detector, despite such a thing not existing. These politicians know nothing about what they're legislating.
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These politicians know nothing about what they're legislating.
Unfortunately, they don't need to know anything about the subject of their legislation. All that's necessary is that they push bills that they can subsequently point to as proof that they're "doing something about the [insert subject here] crisis". And in some ways, it's even better for them if their bills get defeated; that way they can point to the group that was most responsible for their loss and demonize them as being against [insert justification for the bills] -- that way, they get to puff themselves
Douches On Junk (Score:4, Insightful)
Saw this movie recenttly... (Score:3)
The Lives of Others (2006) [imdb.com], about life in the Communist GDR (East Germany). There is a plot where one of the main characters is writes a news story the authorities don't approve of. They have many prominent authors identified by their preferred make/model of manual typewriter, so the fellow is smuggled a compact model from outside the republic so he can write without the government tracing the writing to him.
Unless the California state government plans to interfere with interstate commerce (which I believe is a violation of the constitution), this new measure wont matter at all, and I doubt they want to be affiliated with Cold War regimes.
I guess maybe I am missing something (Score:4, Informative)
I have just 3 points. .22lr has a SAAMI standard maximum chamber pressure of 24,000
I know I am getting old, but it seems like just last week there were no commercial 3D printers, they were all home built. Then the hobby reached critical mass, and now there is a big market with lots of commercial models, and people making a living running giant print farms. But it was still very recently that most printers were not commercial. All that knowledge has not had time to go away, the firmware running these printers is still actively developed and freely available. So my first point is you don't need to buy a printer to own one.
My second point is that machine components in isolation are very seldom indicative of the application of the whole assembly. For some sort of AI agent to actually identify the real gun parts among the other non gun machine components would require the AI agent to have access to all the components printed on all the printers owned by an entity. Basically it would require a massive database of everything you ever printed. Logistically difficult and legally contentious, but also there are people and companies prototyping devices which are company secrets on 3D printers. They are not going to accept printers that give all their development designs to the government, and wow, talk about an industrial espionage target.
And finally this whole discussion feels very much like a straw man to me. 3D printed guns just are not that good. You still have to have metal components to make a gun. There is not a plastic printable on your general purpose 3D printer that can come close to making a chamber strong enough to hold the pressure of even wimpy rounds.
PSI. It is also pretty warm. Sure, I am sure you can print a chamber that will fire a round, but I would not shoot it, because you may have a better than 50% chance of the bullet going out the correct direction, but your chances are no where near high enough for me to put myself in harms way.
So yeah, your theoretical fanatic assassin might be willing to use a plastic gun capable of firing a single round in its working life, but to make a functional reusable gun is going to require metal barrels, chambers, and bolts. So the 3D printed gun as a real danger to society is a myth.
Now a slam fire shotgun made with plumbing pipe with a nail welded in for a firing pin, those are actually functional and not hard to construct with a modicum of mechanical knowledge and tools. Still not safe, but more reliable than anything 100% plastic.
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Read carefully: proposed != passed (Score:2)
This is akin to your drunk buddy telling you he's going to quit his job and start a new business...and learn French...and run a marathon...and los
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Bingo.
It is too expensive for private interests to build such a system and then convince people to willingly use it.
However, if they convince government to do it for them, using taxpayer money, then it would be trivial to then layer on additional "protections" that benefit their pocketbooks.
Imagine if John Deere was able to say "You can't plastic print these parts, because they are a public safety hazard to people using John Deere equipment, and we don't want people counterfeiting and selling these parts."
Once again (Score:2)
Politicians display profound ignorance of technology
They live in a fantasy world where they believe that laws can control everything
Many 3D Printers are Home-Built (Score:2)
Sigh (Score:2)
As I said before elsewhere:
How are you going to detect anything but, say, a handful of well-known STLs? And then draw attention to those by banning them?
How are you then going to stop people doing the inevitable thing: Printing innocent-looking prints that can be broken down into useful parts for "banned" items?
People will literally take the latter as a challenge, and build weapons, etc. that use nothing more than standard replacement parts from other devices so you can say "Oh, that's just an X part from
Smoke and Mirrors (Score:3)
Last I heard, about a month and a half ago actually, it is COMPLETELY LEGAL in the USA* to make your own gun. You just can't sell it, transfer it, and it has to be within Federal law in regards to barrel and overall length and a few other features. Oh, and it can't be an automatic unless you get a permit first.
(* last I heard CA was still part of the USA. did they secede while I was getting dinner or something?)
Not to mention anyone with more brain cells than the Cali politicians seem to have can walk into a hardware store, buy some pipe fittings and build what was commonly called a "zip gun" in a few hours. And it would be much easier, faster, and lets face it safer than a 3D printed gun. The BOM and instructions are all over the Internet already.
This whole thing is just California's political critters trying to look like they are doing something while they ignore or can't fix whatever real problems the state has.
"Pay no attention to the issues behind the curtain."
I'm not up to speed on what is California's current list of issues so I'm not going to try and comment on them.
Any better informed CA residents want to chime in with what is really going on?
Already a Thing (Score:2)
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This content restriction is already a thing on printers everywhere. Try printing a bank note and see what happens.
The currency detection pattern (The "EURion Constellation [wikipedia.org]") was added to the design of banknotes and certain other documents to enable detection. Good luck getting the printable gun STEP/STL/GCODE people to embed a special small easily-detected feature into their files!
Also worth noting that currency detection isn't a law, and isn't in every printer. The few companies making high-quality color printer/copier internals caved to political pressure and "voluntarily" added detection for a very simple patter
Welcome to Democrat ultra-majority rule (Score:2)
The State Senate is 30 Democrats to 10 Republicans. The state Assembly is 60 Democrats to 20 Republicans. The standard definition of majority rule is anything over 1:1, and the definition of super-majority rule (where the majority can do anything and steamroller their opponents) is 2:1. This is a ratio of 3:1 and at this ratio the majority in CA does not even listen to the questions or opinions of their opponents. ANYBODY with that big of a majority will be corrupted and divorced from reality merely by thei
Lawyers thinking they define how the world works (Score:2)
As any good engineer knows, they do not.
Need state approved toilet paper to wipe your own (Score:2)
California's version "adds a certification bureaucracy on top: state-approved algorithms, state-approved software control processes, state-approved printer models, quarterly list updates
This is the most California thing I've ever read. Unconstitutional, unenforceable, and a massive increase in costs and bureaucracy; they hit the trifecta! I wonder if printer manufacturers that bake their own bread will be exempt once their checks to the governor's presidential campaign clear.
Incidentally, this is the kind of stupid shit that helps Trump and people like him get elected over and over.
Law makers are fools (Score:2)
Holy shit, are they so fucking stupid to not realize that anyone can build a fucking printer in a few hours after buying the parts from suppliers anywhere in the world?
They're wasting money on this bullshit boondoggle to appear busy and concerned.
The is yet another law with a valid purpose, but unable to do anything useful.
Like making marijuana illegal. Sure, it's a crime, but it's virtually unenforceable. It's the "Pleasure Boat" of the legal system. They keep tossing in money, yet they accomplish nothing.
Anti-copying technology for currency (Score:2)
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Did you know all color photocopiers and printers sold have anti-counterfeiting technology? There are special patterns [wikipedia.org] printed on bills that photocopiers and printers can detect and will refuse to print.
Most commercial printers, copiers, and print engines, but not "all"
So it was solved not by a law, and not by software that looks for anything resembling currency, but rather by placing a simple, easily software-detectable [frenchbanknotes.com], pattern into all currency, and ensuring that anti-counterfeiting tools treat any currency lacking this pattern as fake money.
Okay, so now we just need to mandate the (mostly anonymous, decentralized) designers of printable gun CAD files to embed these special patterns into their open-sour
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Actually, I thought it was legal in the US to make your own firearm for personal use. You just can't sell it. So why would it be different if you 3D print it vs. fabricate it with some machine shop equipment?
You are correct -- under federal law, it is legal to make your own firearm for personal use (PMF [atf.gov]), though manufacturing firearms with the intent to resell for profit requires a federal license (FFL). A few states are trying to pass their own local restrictions on firearms manufacture. Some of these proposed bills, such as in the states of Colorado and Washington, also include CNC machine tool fabrication in their bans.
This specific bill proposed in California is focused solely on 3D printing
Next comes taxes (Score:2)
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This is an interesting point (taxation, or licensing fees) that I'm not sure others have brought up before. However, it is a logical extension to the idea that once a review/ban platform is in place, you could then pay a "fee" to the right people to let you print the desired item.
Let's assume that they're not blatant enough to slap on something called a production tax. Instead let's assume they're going to pass an "Environmental Recycling and Recovery Fee" and a "Emissions Control Fee", because, Californi
Why (Score:2)
...are you so desperate for a gun? You can afford a 3D printer, but not a gun?
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"DOJ" in this case refers to the California Department of Justice, not the US Federal Department of Justice.
Text of the proposed California Assembly bill is here:
https://leginfo.legislature.ca... [ca.gov]
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