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by: C. Sven Johnson
Here’s a quick note to call attention to something that might be of interest: Another avatar fabbing outfit has set up shop. Most of you are probably already aware of Fabjectory, the service that’s been “3D printing” Second Life avatars and objects for the last year or so. Well now there’s a service available for fabbing World of Warcraft game characters.
by: C. Sven Johnson
I’ve said it before and I’ll say it again: my primary interest in tracking the intellectual property issues currently plaguing the music and movie industries, waiting in the ebook wings for book publishers, and even frustrating hordes of bloggers whose content is appropriated and used to create spamblogs, is that at some point their problems become my problems; becomes the problem of anyone who designs and fabricates real products for a living.
Continue reading "The Looming Dark Horizon: When the IP Mess Hits Industrial Design & Co." »
by: C. Sven Johnson
I’ve been wanting to post an entry regarding an interview with luxury brands consultant, businesswoman and author Uche Okonkwo over on the Mass Customization website (Link), but as I’ve been out of sorts lately I’m only now getting back to it.
by: C. Sven Johnson
Couple of interesting bits today. Over on C|Net there’s nanotech-related news. In “IBM prints with molecules” (Link) we have a follow-on by what sounds like the same group of scientists to an earlier demonstration of a nano-scale “mass production” process.
by: Guy Kawasaki
One of the challenges that geeks, inventors, hobbyists, hackers, burners, and artists who are trying to change the world face is finding a place to do their work. Ideally, it would have lots of equipment, supplies, and other geeks. Until the last year, they would have to set up their own workshop or beg for space at a machine shop. Now they can go and hang out at TechShop
in Menlo Park, California.
by: C. Sven Johnson
Having already done the virtual reality and Industrial Design round-ups, I’m finishing off with this collection of links which - in some way or another - have something to do with cross-reality ideas/concepts and rapid manufacturing. Well, at least they come kinda close (in my mind).
by: C. Sven Johnson
Confession time. I’d started writing a piece on “Reverse Product Placement” last February with the intent of selling it the same way that David Edery (via the Harvard Business Review) was selling his short article on the topic. Only my position, after reading about* his article and giving the idea some additional thought, was that his definition is flawed; that true reverse product placement was, as I recently described in another post, something else and what he was talking about was more like futures product placement.
by: C. Sven Johnson
Via a post on the Mass Custom website comes word of a pretty good article over on Design News, “Rapid Manufacturing’s Role in the Factory of the Future” (Link).
by: C. Sven Johnson
I had originally intended to include news of the New York Public Library’s temporary installation of an Espresso book-on-demand machine (aka PerfectBook 040) in the post preceding this one, only this news really deserves its own entry. It’s not that print-on-demand is a new development. It’s that print-on-demand is a new development for so many people.
by: C. Sven Johnson
While reading something yesterday concerning marketing in virtual worlds I resisted the urge to comment. Last night and again early this morning, I further resisted the temptation to post something here regarding what I’d read. And I’m now resisting the urge to slip something in. I won’t.
by: C. Sven Johnson
I read the following in Neil Gershenfeld’s book Fab and thought it worth posting here:
Etienne found that the most difficult technical lesson to teach was imagination. He could see the possibilities lurking within technological junk, but he had a hard time conveying to students how to put the pieces back together short of actually doing it himself. This problem inspired Etienne to turn to the same kind of three-dimensional CAD software that Frank Gehry and Larry Sass were using. He taught his students how to make a virtual version of their studio, freeing them to assemble simulated parts.
