I remember a few years ago, back in ~2014/2015, there were patents on certain designs or mechanics of 3D printing that were expiring. At the time printers were generally pretty expensive and the choice was basically $1000+ or make your own RepRap, of course there were chinese printers but a lot of the time the price difference wasn’t great enough to justify not just making yourself one and grabbing sailfish or whatnot for your control box.Prices were going down, usability of the printers were rising. There was a ton of excitement for consumer 3D printing and it was plastered in all the news and lots of reddit articles about it.Fast forward to today and it is even more hobby than ever. There is even more selection of 3D printers to buy, substantially better than what you had access to back in the day, but now it seems like it’s not meant for the consumer anymore – the tools are even better but the drive behind it isn’t.What happened? http://ift.tt/2iGuxXb
