Agreed, the almost non sequitur mention of VR feels like a straw man. The authors seem to sort of dismiss VR as a fad that disappeared with the headsets and Powergloves. Meanwhile, every year, we're seeing a steady march upwards in GPU power, mass-market uptake of 3D immersive gaming, and devices like the Wii or Kinect selling like crazy in numbers that would have been unthinkable in Jaron Lanier's heyday. VR, or aspects of its original "dream", are steadily making inroads into daily life.

If anything, 3D printing will be exactly like VR in the sense that it will have an initial burst of excitement in the mass media, followed by a long steady march toward ubiquitous, banal, take-for-grantedness.