California’s bill, AB 2047, will not only mandate censorware on all 3D printers; it will also criminalize the use of open-source alternatives. Repeating the mistakes of DRM won’t make anyone safer, but it will hurt innovation in the state and risks a slew of new consumer harms ranging from surveillance to platform lock-in. California must stand with creators and reject this legislation before it’s too late.
  • Crozekiel@lemmy.zipEnglish
    19·
    1 day ago

    I believe the entire goal of RepRap was to build a machine that could build all the parts needed to build another machine. Most of the parts for a lot of machines are either 3d printable or bog-standard off-the-shelf parts that could be used for millions of other things. I have a feeling the really scary target would be software, something similar to the draconian age-verification BS being run around.

    • NauticalNoodle@lemmy.mlEnglish
      1·
      3 hours ago

      I don’t see how they could realistically target Marlin firmware. It’s incredibly straightforward software/firmware that could easily be forked and duplicated. Even the old driver boards (Ramps) were originally hand-made pcb’s designed by fellow hobbyists.

      • Crozekiel@lemmy.zipEnglish
        2·
        3 hours ago

        They make it illegal to distribute, install, use, etc. They make it illegal to sell, distribute, build, etc. any printer that can run on Marlin (hoping to force manufacturers to block anyone installing non-oem firmware on the machines at all).

        I’m not saying it’s reasonable or feasible, but the people making the laws clearly don’t know or care about any of that.

        Edit - If they make enough stuff illegal, they don’t need to catch you breaking the law when they decide to arrest you. They just arrest you and then figure out which crimes you were committing.

    • Jiral@lemmy.orgEnglish
      4·
      1 day ago

      Targetting commercial offers would not cut it though. They would have to make octoprint, open source firmware etc a crime. A lot of printer run exclusively on non-commercial software and on Chinese control boards, with or without raspberry pi.

      • Crozekiel@lemmy.zipEnglish
        2·
        6 hours ago

        That’s kind of what they already want to do, or are trying to do with this legislation. And the age verification stuff has no exception for open-source. The people behind this stuff absolutely want to kill any and all open source, both hardware and software.