Anecdata: I love the i3 for its looks (do not own one).
446 karma · joined December 10, 2016
We're working on this. Long term goal is a simple trustworthy digital agent for getting, understanding, controlling your own data. Please contact if interested.
Which organizations (esp. in bay area) are most effectively advocating for data ethics (including freedom, dignity, privacy)?
EFF.org?
I am looking for organizations focused on a charter of rights and responsibilities for software providers, data processors, etc. We've been terrible at self-regulating as an industry, which is absolutely begging for onerous regulations.
- I don't understand the value proposition relative to other cloud storage providers
- Hire someone to do your UX (could start with just landing page layout, icons, and color theme)
- Selling to developers is a challenge (http://www.defmacro.org/2017/01/18/why-rethinkdb-failed.html)
- Your pricing sets you up to compete on Gb/$/month which sounds like a hard battle for any startup to win
- Keep going!
This seems to be a universal challenge with language interfaces like Siri.
Unfortunately the beans and cabbage hardly sound appetizing for a bread. The obvious ideas are wheat, nuts, and dried fruits.
Any good resources for this?
We realized that the vision of a 3D printer in every house was absurd. Consumer ≠ designer. Amazon is cheaper, faster, easier, higher quality unless I am putting on my design/engineering hat and doing R&D/NPI.
We realized that 3D printers are just manufacturing tools, albeit really interesting ones. They belong in places where you might find CNC machines, laser cutters, etc.
3D printing is quietly revolutionizing small areas of R&D/NPI/MFG in every field. For instance, small to medium volume end part manufacturing: https://www.jabil.com/insights/blog-main/3d-printing-reality...
Lots of technologies are maturing and costs are coming down as the ecosystem moves from a high margin low volume prototyping mindset to a low margin high volume manufacturing mindset (look up MJF, EBAM, DMLS, EBM, CLIP, LOM, etc. in addition to the well known FDM and SLA technologies).
Can't get into the details on evaluating part quality other than to say that I personally think MJF parts are awesome - completely different thing than FDM. Just considering look and feel, MJF part density and texture create the perception of quality.
We use HP jet fusion 3D printers to manufacture production parts at Jabil (see https://www.jabil.com/insights/blog-main/3d-printing-reality...) and MJF is quite different from other tech e.g. binder jetting, LOM, FDM, SLA, SLS, DMLS, EBM, CBAM, CLIP.
Differences include cost structures, speeds, material capabilities, resolution, etc.
There were a lot of challenges and concerns described, but rather than attempting to surmount the challenge, the team decided to quit (of course, sometimes that's the best choice given the circumstances).
Compared to other solutions I've used like python + numpy + pandas, Matlab, Mathcad, heh even Excel, Julia is a breath of fresh air. Fast, clean, powerful.
This conversation makes me think of physics, which I'd consider the liberal arts of scientific degrees.
Perhaps the graduates are annoying, but I think there is an assumption that if you can do physics you can succeed in other areas (which may not be assumed in reverse).
Either way, much of the value of a degree is signaling and there are other ways to signal competence, e.g. open source projects (might be less expensive but harder).
The question is whether money can be raised at acceptable terms. Uber had a lot of leverage because everyone wanted to invest in Uber.
This is exactly why I think solar will beat nuclear hands-down. Solar enables gradual adoption, unlike nuclear's power-plant sized step function. Regardless of the actual price in $/kWh, people like doing easy things.
What matters is that solar is generally perceived to be safer, easier, and cleaner than nuclear at any scale. I feel confident that I could set up my own solar installation safely, and that makes me more likely to do so, regardless of the fatality rates of using ladders or driving to the hardware store.
Because it's easier for clean energy adopters to take small steps towards solar than large steps towards nuclear, I think that's what they will do.
Then it's a no-brainer to test whether it's possible to make a non-security token that still retains some of the benefits of crypto tokens.
I am working on a crypto token designed to avoid the bad incentives and legal issues with current ICOs that might make a good test case:
* Token provides immediate practical benefit (collaboration on important data using distributed storage, narrowing focus from Sia, Storj, Filecoin, etc) from day one
* Token sold in small tranches over an extremely long time period, ideally at stable price
* No intermediate ERC20 or similar token pre-sale
* Pre-mined tokens (eventually sold) make up small fraction of total supply
For the Howey Test, I think it's most reasonable to aim for either no expectation of profit or no common enterprise.
If anyone is interested in helping test this, contact me!
The ability to fund development of important network infrastructure with a related digital asset is too useful to remain in indefinite legal limbo!
3D printers are just another tool in the manufacturing toolbox. The sets of materials and structures printers are made from barely overlap with the sets of materials and structures that the same printers make.
If 3D printers could make themselves, I think they would look a lot more like biological organisms and a lot less like laser copiers.
That said, the Desktop Metal parts I've seen are beautiful.
There's always metal too.
Shaving is not a new problem.
I don't know what percentage of the plasma energy in RPD is transferred to the metal, but fiber or CO2 lasers are significantly less efficient than electron beams (~40% vs ~70% absorption based on a very brief search).
I think processes like RPD, Sciaky's EBAM, and Arcam's EBM are generally going to win on price compared to traditional laser sintering like EOS DMLS in the long term, especially for big parts. They replace expensive metal powder with cheaper powder (EBM) or wire (EBAM, RPD), and expensive fiber lasers with more powerful and cheaper electron beams or plasma torches.
It's hard to get fast large-scale metal deposition with a laser: the EOS M400-4 seems one of the highest power laser based solution with 4x 400W fiber lasers (Concept Laser has a 2x 1 kW model). Sounds fancy until you realize that's about as much power as a nice microwave. For comparison, Hypertherm sells 80 kW plasma torches, and Skiaky sells 42 kW electron beam welding systems.
Cooling the parts being printed is a big problem since printing a big glowing puddle isn't very useful, but increasing build volume / part size helps drop the power density.