It occurred to me today that a lot of people are using their RepStraps to build Mendel parts. Then I wondered, “How many Mendels are in operation now, anyhow?”
I would guess a dozen or so – with far more on the way. What I find interesting is the seemingly large proliferation of Mendels (or, at the very least, blogs about Mendel parts and construction) versus the dissemination of Darwins within the prior year.
If this is the case (and I really have no evidence of this, just my impressions), is it something about the RepRap project that has suddenly taken hold? Something about the Mendel over the Darwin? Is it the increased RepRap documentation, more YouTube/Vimeo videos? Is it the availability of parts on eBay, plastic/resin parts from molds, or something else? Is it MakerBot? Thingiverse? Facebook, Twitter, MakerFaires, or MakerTweetBook? More mainstream coverage in the media? Was is health care reform, killer bees, or the loss of the Mars rover? Is it subliminal messages embedded in the MakerBot website? Have we been plugged into the Matrix?!?!
I know someone is going to say “a combination of these things” – but really, if you had to pick one thing, what would you say it is? 1
- P.S. I’m voting for the killer bees. [↩]
Honestly, I’d seen the Darwin before, and the whole thing looked like a cobbled-together, unstable box of rods. I don’t mean to insult the creators of the Darwin and there are many of them that are working great! The way the whole system operated just didn’t seem all that stable. The plain look reeked of complexity and difficulty in assembly and keeping the whole thing together and straight.
After I saw the Mendel, it’s simpler design and seemingly higher stability, I decided that was the bot I would make. I really think that design has something to do with it, perhaps one of the reason MakerBot has taken off so well too!
I’ve never had the opportunity to see a Darwin – just pictures. I remember liking it’s design because it almost looked like the kind of thing you could have on the corner of your desk – rather than a McWire which doesn’t look like anything other than a McWire.
But, I have to agree about the Mendel. From the time I saw eD’s sketch of the Mendel back in November 2008 I thought it was super cool. Larger build area, fewer parts, what’s not to like?
I’d have to say it’s related to the growing levels of frustration with the status quo to be honest. Personally I’ve just reached the point where I’m sick and tired of working so hard for so long and not getting any better off than before. Reprap offers a means to change the rules. Allow me to become more self sustaining and break some of the chains that have been slowly shacked on me over the last decade. Sort of a giant reset button on reality. I think that’s why I’m so offended at the efforts to make it into a business. Every day we are all working ourselves for the company store, not interest in being a part of that anymore.
:) ManDrake, I think you’re the Hobbes to my Locke. I find it hard to believe there’s a growing interest in RepRap because people are frustrated with the status quo. I feel it’s more about people being inspired to create and share.
That said – I may kinda get what you’re talking about. It’s easy to get stuck – especially in this post-recession era.
While I sympathize with Hobbes’ cynical view of human society, I don’t agree with most of his conclusions. I’m more of a strong believer in my own variant of the Structural Functionalist worldview. Societies are machines, organisms if you will. Mechanical and organic mechanisms don’t change quickly without something disrupting the equilibrium of the system. Attempting to abandon 100 years of human tradition seems like a pretty big attack on the status quo to me. And that’s if you only think of this as an attack on centralized manufacturing. If you consider it to be an attack on the manufacturing elites control of the building of goods, then what the first “craftsman” guilds were what 300 AD or so? That’s attacking the bedrock of all human society. Now we’ll all rationalize it in our own way, so it will make sense to each of us on a personal level. But the movement itself underneath those rationalizations is an attempt to establish a new equilibrium in the mechanism.
But civilized people can disagree about these things.