3DPrinting
3DPrinting is a place where makers of all skill levels and walks of life can learn about and discuss 3D printing and development of 3D printed parts and devices.
The r/functionalprint community is now located at: or !functionalprint@fedia.io
There are CAD communities available at: !cad@lemmy.world or !freecad@lemmy.ml
Rules
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No bigotry - including racism, sexism, ableism, homophobia, transphobia, or xenophobia. Code of Conduct.
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Be respectful, especially when disagreeing. Everyone should feel welcome here.
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No porn (NSFW prints are acceptable but must be marked NSFW)
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No Ads / Spamming / Guerrilla Marketing
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Do not create links to reddit
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If you see an issue please flag it
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No guns
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No injury gore posts
If you need an easy way to host pictures, https://catbox.moe/ may be an option. Be ethical about what you post and donate if you are able or use this a lot. It is just an individual hosting content, not a company. The image embedding syntax for Lemmy is 
Moderation policy: Light, mostly invisible
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What value or expertise are you imagining that you would be providing that wouldn't be available to somebody downloading a model file and bringing it to a community library that has a 3d printer?
That's not a rhetorical question and the answer isn't automatically no. There is significant value in making things easy and convenient for people, and that is far from the only option available for you to add value. If you can answer that, and the value you are adding is significant and/or involves skills or tools or equipment that would not be readily available to most people, you may have a business case, but you need to be able to answer that before anyone can really assess the practicality of your dream. But you do have competition, a lot of competition, and that means you need to be ready to compete, and it's never going to be a sure thing. Statistically most startup businesses fail. But I think that's because a lot of them don't go in with a full understanding of what it takes to make an idea into a business. Money doesn't just fall out of the sky onto your idea. You need to work hard at it, understand the problem space and your competition, answer all sorts of difficult questions, build a name, clientele, reputation and brand and develop it into something that might become profitable (or might not) and whose profitability may suddenly change in either direction at any time depending on how accurately you are able to understand the constantly changing market conditions. And you need to be realistic about whether you think you can do this.
This.
3D printers are now not more expensive or harder to use than 2D printers, and they are becoming quite common.
Same as you wouldn't just start up a copy shop just because you own an HP inkjet printer, just owning a random 3D printer doesn't really qualify you for running a 3D print shop.
Incredibly well put, and this largely applies to anything, not just 3D printing.