Comment by bpicolo | Hacker News Reader

Comment by bpicolo | Hacker News Reader

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The actual numbers would definitely be a guess out of thin air, but the mechanical keyboard community is pretty massive and spends a bunch of money on this stuff.

Here's a drop that is currently at 88k revenue for massdrop: https://www.massdrop.com/buy/massdrop-x-redsuns-gmk-red-samu...

638 purchases @ 139.99/set

Somebody has dropped 1k on a single custom made key on the secondary market. https://www.reddit.com/r/MechanicalKeyboards/wiki/keyboard_t...

The gaming market has produced all sorts of hobbyist businesses, and that's a market actually big enough to see a few potentially billion dollar businesses. I'm not entirely sure whether something like DXRacer[0] would fall into line of a hobbyist/enthusiast business but it feels like it should to me (and I'm mentioning it because it feels like a larger sort of hobbyist business). It's definitely in that realm in terms of having a pretty specific target market and a relatively higher price point.

[0] https://www.dxracer.com/

I'm one of those people who admittedly spend way too much money on keyboards :) I don't have any artesian keycaps, but I have bough aftermarket (?) keycaps that uses plastic of a higher quality. You can tell the difference.

There are also people in the DIY mechanical keyboard market selling circuit boards, plates, cases, etc... Again, it's a really niche market, but people are willing to spend a lot more money at a hobbyist/enthusiast level.

>I don't have any artesian keycaps

Artisanal. Artesian means related to a special type of water wells :-)

‘Artisan’ in the MK community.

`Bespoke` in the marketing community.

I'm there too, I have 4 $100+ keyboards now, and 1 of them is an "ortholinear" style (keys are in a perfect grid) that I built from a kit and had custom keycaps printed with names of programs on them. With some semi-custom software I use it like a physical "whole computer" shortcut pad.

I now have a button that can launch a terminal window, a button that launches HN, one that does a git pull on all my current projects, etc...

Like you said, it's a niche market, but it's one where most people are happy to pay the higher prices for something more tailored to their needs, and it's a rare "physical" area where a guy in his garage can compete with big companies.

I just recently got a new 3d printer, and I think after I get it more tuned I will be able to print fairly good quality keycaps. If they are good enough, I might try selling custom made-to-order keycaps if there is any interest.

Where can you get custom printing on keycaps? I have an Ergodox but what I really can't get used to (even after 2 years of full time use) is the lack of labeling for the special keys. I've looked for years for ways to do custom printing or labeling but all methods I found suck.

WASDkeyboards offers printed singles in multiple ways. They aren't the best quality (they are UV coated ABS, I used their keycaps on another keyboard and the coating started to wear through after about a year of daily use, the text is still fine though), but they are the king of custom printing right now in my opinion.

You can go to [0] to get just text on a keycap with a fairly easy web-ui to describe the text, position, and size you want it.

Or you can take it entirely into your own hands and go to [1] to give them a vector file that they will custom print on to the keys.

They also offer that service in a "full keyboard set" option [2], so you don't need to do a ton of keys individually if you want to do the whole keyboard (although the full sets most likely won't fit your profile, but they do fit a good number of more standard keyboard layouts)

Again, they aren't the best quality, but they do a good job, and they take care of their customers. Plus the amount of customization you can do is pretty fucking insane. [3] is always my go-to example for just how customizable they are. Not only full color printing, but also individual key plastic color selection.

[0] http://www.wasdkeyboards.com/index.php/products/printed-keyc...

[1] http://www.wasdkeyboards.com/index.php/products/printed-keyc...

[2] http://www.wasdkeyboards.com/index.php/products/keycap-set/1...

[3] https://www.flickr.com/photos/wasdkeyboards/28965975050/

roel_v just buy some right sized blanks in your profile and use a paint pen to label them, or get some relegendable caps in your profile and make little paper labels.

That or just dump the ergodox when you realize that it's just a pale sad imitation of a kinesis advantage.

I am not parent commenter but you can pry my ErgoDox EZ Shine from my cold dead hands.

The one you mentioned doesn’t even look pretty. ErgoDox EZ Shine is wonderful both in use and in how it looks!

That set is actually produced by GMK, a large-ish German company [0]. There is a designer who gets a cut (I'm not sure the percentage off the top of my head), but it's almost definitely not enough to live off of.

[0] https://www.gmk-electronic-design.de/en.html

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