Having a machine that can make any item imaginable is an invention that has been near the top of the human wish list for a long time. Innumerable instances of it exist in science fiction, but we also see it in writings by Descartes, Aquinas, Plato, and others going back as far as we look. Evidently, the desire to turn thoughts into things is an intrinsic part of the human psyche. Personal fabrication has an unending number of practical applications and there is intense satisfaction seeing your ideas take physical form. Our goal is to make it possible for people to make anything they can imagine. This capability will have a profound impact on the way people think about commerce while disrupting a number of industries.
The ultimate Personal Programmable Universal Manufacturing Machine would be:
Personal: Small/cheap/simple enough that everybody can access them to produce objects that meet their personal needs.
Programmable: Able to faithfully reproduce an object from a description of the item (e.g. a software file). People will be able to share their creations, modify existing designs, and produce objects to their exact specifications.
Universal: Capable of making anything. A perfect golf club, Fabergé eggs, whatever you want.
Manufacturing Machine: Requires no skill to operate: printing a tea kettle will be no more difficult that printing a Word document.
However, “PPUMM” is hard to pronounce, so we refer to them as “Replicators”, like on Star Trek.
Sadly, no such machine exists yet. The closest existing “proto-replicators” are expensive, require expert level training, and can only create a limited subset of items. Even with these limitations, “proto-replicators” are still new, exciting, and revolutionary and we have a way to bring their capabilities to the masses.
We have developed a weekly series on Proto-Replicators for those interested in learning more:
Part 1: Introduction
Part 2: Technology Overview
Part 3: Laser Cutters
Part 4: Print-on-demand
Part 5: 3D Printing
Part 6: CNC Milling
Part 7: Printing Electronics
Part 8: Printing Motors
Tune in next week for the technology overview, and in the meantime, leave comments here to help guide our discussion.
