Guns aren't that scary. We are good at identifying and arresting/shooting gunmen, they can rarely kill more than a handful of us. Look forward enough in time and be afraid of the time when it's easy to download and print virulent pathogens or other WMDs.
As technology amplifies individuals power, it will only take one unhinged person to cause massive damage.
I don't think law enforcement/military/intelligence/censorship approaches will work when massive destructive power is in the hands of individuals.
Possible if incomplete solutions I can foresee are in the realm of genetically engineering increased empathy in humanity and eliminating psychopathic/anti-social tendencies from the gene pool. Eugenics is unpalatable and too slow, we will need an intelligent and targeted handover from evolution to engineering our DNA.
One day our civilization may wake up and realize exploiting entire classes and nations is untenable in the face of asymmetrical revenge.
This isn't at hand today, but my mind can't help but follow this trend to its inevitable eventuality. On spaceship earth we are all in this together.
EDIT: My choice of language was poor. Guns are scary, what I should have said is they are not an existential threat.
EDIT 2, this time for clarity and with feeling: When I say we are good at stopping gunmen and they rarely kill more than handful of us, I did not mean in the aggregate. I meant an individual gunmen rarely kills more than a handful of us.
"Both robbers were killed, eleven police officers and seven civilians were injured, and numerous vehicles and other property were damaged or destroyed by the nearly 2,000 rounds of ammunition fired by the robbers and police."
No one but the gunmen were killed. Of course the counterpoint to this anecdote are mass shootings like Columbine. These shootings terrorize us emotionally and destroy families, but when thought of statistically they are an extremely minor threat.
> Guns aren't that scary. We are good at identifying and arresting/shooting gunmen, they can rarely kill more than a handful of us
Guessing you're from the US - where there were 14,078 firearm related homicide deaths in 2010? I don't think that's an indicator you're any good at identifying gunmen at all. 14,000 deaths is also considerably more than "a handful".
Gun deaths in UK in 2007 totalled 51. So yes, I do feel less scared in the UK than I do in USA.
In 2010, 499 service personnel were killed in Afghanistan. I wonder what public sentiment would be if that total was closer to the 14,000 back at home.
I heard the designer of the gun on the BBC today. He said he created the design because he is a Libertarian and is trying to hasten the time when all information is freely available. He rejects government censorship of information.
He also said that the printer used to make his gun costs about $8,000 but that people were reporting making a working gun with as low as a $2,000 printer.
It's worth noting that with a basic milling machine (about $400) an individual in the U.S. can legally manufacture for personal use an AR-15 lower receiver from either a bare or partially machined forging ($50) in as little as a few hours. Some have done the job with only a Dremel or hand drill, making the investment much cheaper.
I share this only to illustrate that this technology is not enabling a radical new ability to produce cheap personal-use weapons, but more of an (expensive) prototype evolutionary step in the process.
In addition, possibly in contrast to this printed design, a home made receiver that is properly surface-hardened after machining is fully as capable and safe as any other receiver manufactured to the TDP.
So what's the legality of distributing just the magnet link hash? That's just a 40 char string. If somebody would publish that string in this place here, is that illegal as well? It's a lot of steps removed from a crime:
1- crime where a shot is fired
2- gun
3- gun creation
4- gun 3d file
5- somebody supplying you this file
6- the magnet directory giving you a link to the file supplier
7- the link hash giving you a link to the magnet directory
Free speech is free speech. This is how Phil Zimmerman defeated export controls in the first place with PGP. He developed the code outside of the U.S. (where it was legal), printed books containing it (one of the best-protected free speech rights), imported the book to the U.S. (so that he's not trafficking in "munitions"), scanned in the code in the U.S., and formed a PGP in the U.S.
The U.S.-based code could then be distributed within the U.S. since ITAR is an export control only. The sheer ridiculousness of the whole thing eventually helped lead to legalizing useful crypto in the U.S. I guess we'll see what happens here.
> the Government explains that it wants to review whether the designs are in compliance with arms export control laws.
I don't understand why this is so reactionary. People have been (very publicly) attempting to make a working 3D printable gun for years, and only now that it's finally happened the appropriate government agency has decided to explore the legal implications?
The government isn't pondering some philosophical question about 3D guns.
Defense Distributed has an active federal license to manufacture and distribute firearms. By posting blueprints online, it's very likely they've violated the conditions of that license.
From ITAR, what qualifies as sensitive:
Technical data directly related to the manufacture or
production of any defense articles enumerated elsewhere
in this category that are designated as Significant
Military Equipment (SME) shall itself be designated SME.
Further clarification:
Information .... which is required for the design
development, production, manufacture, assembly, operation,
repair, testing, maintenance or modification of defense
articles. This includes information in the form of
blueprints, drawings, photographs, plans, instructions
and documentation.
How it can be in violation of law:
An agreement whereby a U.S. person grants a foreign
person an authorization to manufacture defense articles
abroad and which involves or contemplates .... The
export of technical data or defense articles ...
without first obtaining the required license or
written approval from the ODTC.
Possible punishment entails:
Any person who willfully ... Violates any provision ... of
the Arms Export Control Act ... or ... any rule or regulation
issued under either section ... shall upon conviction be
fined for each violation not more than $1,000,000 or
imprisoned not more than 20 years, or both.
Their blueprints clearly qualify as sensitive, any download traffic from overseas is enough to prove they distributed to 'foreign persons'. The political calculus could save them since it would appear like Obama is trying to ban guns even though Distributed Defense is clearly in violation of federal law.
I hope for their sake, there was no download activity from Iran, Cuba, North Korea, etc...
It seems to me that if you can afford a 3D printer, the computer to run it and the technical ability to do the printing and assembly you probably already have better options than a funky zip gun of questionable quality. I would think the money to buy the above equipment would get you a decent gun on the black market if guns are illegal in your country. And if there is no black market to speak of, then you would probably not be allowed to buy the 3D printer in the first place.
It seems like this is more of a novelty than anything useful.
You're right in that this weapon isn't really worth the effort, and if it were only about this particular file neither Defense Distributed or the US government would have cause for concern.
This is a big deal because 1) this is one of the first weapons designed from the ground up to be printed. Most printed firearms based on existing tech break easily because they weren't designed to be built with the materials you can print with. Over the next several years better and better firearms will be designed. In this way it is important the same way the very first shitty light bulb was important. 2) this addresses the still very unanswered question about what options governments have to restrict speech and international distribution of information over the Internet.
Most of the gun proliferation behaviors in the US are rooted in a desire to hurt people. They're using plenty of other tools besides guns to do it, because ultimately, even a nuclear bomb is less efficient at screwing others over than denying universal healthcare.
I'm not sure what the big deal is. Individuals have been smithing guns since their invention. Hillbillies in the Ozarks could make rifled barrels. People with a manual or cnc mill in their garage are making ar15 lower receivers from billet aluminum. The 3d printing technique takes a lot of the skill out of it, but at the moment all you are getting is a low quality plastic gun. As a practical matter I don't think the swapping of gun part cad files is a significant vector for the creation of guns that are used to do bad things.
I can understand the govermental concerns and questions I have are:
1) If such a gun was used in a crime, would bullet rifeling patterns be usable to tie up the shot fired to the plastic barrel gun and let alone the ability to dispose of said gun with a simple lighter.
2) Concerns about it only having a metal firing pin and with that how hard would it be to use say another material for the firing pin like graphite or a the like - only needs to fire one shot
I also understand why this project was done, it was a challange and we like challanges.
But as other have said, it is a simple type of gun that is the form that can be made by anybody wishing to make such a zip gun, still need ammunition.
What the concerns are is they have created a form of weapon that can be produced as easily as a photograph and that is just the tip of the concerns.
I will say that personaly whilst making a printable gun was something that was going to happen, giving out the blueprints for anybody to use and abuse was perhaps akin to writing expliot code and releaseing into the wild for any script kiddy to use and abuse with there click-run mentality.
The sad part is that people pushing out such blueprints for such printers will only mean that down the line such printers will get taxed and curtailed and effect those who mean no harm and the type of people who given a nuke button infron of them would resist in pressing it as they know the concequences.
As soon as a crime is commited with such a gun they will be banned and the 3d printer market will get more controled by legislation. Which is sad when such vigor is not bestowed upon normal guns.
Facts are guns do bad things in bad hands so the net result is they are outlawed in many countries and championed as rights in others. So if anything this highlights the issue with guns and not 3D printers, though I suspect the Rifle associations of the World will not defend 3D printers if they start to be restricted over this issue.
As an aside nukes are illegal, yet if somebody posted blueprints to make one, well that would pan out badly. Yet on some level this is just the same.
I applaud that somebody did and proved it was viable, I'm personaly not happy they gave out the blueprints in a form that enable people who do not understand the issues free access to them. Most will be good people, but not all and that is the crux of concerns however you look at them. So with that this is akin to releaseing 0-day expliot code into the wild in a point and click form.
> giving out the blueprints for anybody to use and abuse was perhaps akin to writing expliot code and releaseing into the wild for any script kiddy to use and abuse with there click-run mentality.
I am no expert, but from what I understand, 3D printing is still far from being a 'click-and-run' type of experience.
It pains me that so many people are talking about the freedom to distribute these designs without discussing the negative impact that "3D printed weapons" will have on the widespread acceptance of 3D printing in homes and communities.
I'd much rather see the world embrace 3D printing than fear it. Talk about "what we can print" after we all have access to 3D printers. We aren't there yet.
And what if each of the individual parts were distributed at different sites? I am thinking of the "world's funniest joke" sketch from Monty Python, the joke so funny it was lethal.
Would any one file describing a single fashionable part be in violation also?
One can not create a riffled barrel out of plastic. This is a $20k zip gun.
"Within production quality firearms, pistol and rifle barrels have tiny grooves cut inside of them. The grooves do not run straight, however are curved slowly throughout the length of the barrel. This technique is called rifling. Rifling causes the bullet to spin as it passes through the barrel. The spinning assists in stabilizing the bullet and making the gun more accurate. "
Clearly impossible to stop the spread of this information, and any attempts to make it possible would be extremely objectionable, but anyone found actually producing or using these weapons should face extreme prison terms. Mass proliferation of handguns is responsible for thousands of deaths each year in this country alone, and we should be taking all feasible steps to reign it in.
Not 24 hours ago the #1 post on HN was that gun crime has been downright plummeting for the past 20 years, despite the fact that more and more guns are being manufactured and sold.
I know it's a tired old saying, but the honest truth is that guns do not kill people, people kill people. Once you realize that, you realize that 3D printable guns are not a danger justifying "extreme prison terms".
[+] [-] willholloway|13 years ago|reply
As technology amplifies individuals power, it will only take one unhinged person to cause massive damage.
I don't think law enforcement/military/intelligence/censorship approaches will work when massive destructive power is in the hands of individuals.
Possible if incomplete solutions I can foresee are in the realm of genetically engineering increased empathy in humanity and eliminating psychopathic/anti-social tendencies from the gene pool. Eugenics is unpalatable and too slow, we will need an intelligent and targeted handover from evolution to engineering our DNA.
One day our civilization may wake up and realize exploiting entire classes and nations is untenable in the face of asymmetrical revenge.
This isn't at hand today, but my mind can't help but follow this trend to its inevitable eventuality. On spaceship earth we are all in this together.
EDIT: My choice of language was poor. Guns are scary, what I should have said is they are not an existential threat.
EDIT 2, this time for clarity and with feeling: When I say we are good at stopping gunmen and they rarely kill more than handful of us, I did not mean in the aggregate. I meant an individual gunmen rarely kills more than a handful of us.
A great example that underlines my point here is the North Hollywood shootout. From Wikipedia (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/North_Hollywood_shootout):
"Both robbers were killed, eleven police officers and seven civilians were injured, and numerous vehicles and other property were damaged or destroyed by the nearly 2,000 rounds of ammunition fired by the robbers and police."
No one but the gunmen were killed. Of course the counterpoint to this anecdote are mass shootings like Columbine. These shootings terrorize us emotionally and destroy families, but when thought of statistically they are an extremely minor threat.
[+] [-] TomGullen|13 years ago|reply
Guessing you're from the US - where there were 14,078 firearm related homicide deaths in 2010? I don't think that's an indicator you're any good at identifying gunmen at all. 14,000 deaths is also considerably more than "a handful".
Gun deaths in UK in 2007 totalled 51. So yes, I do feel less scared in the UK than I do in USA.
In 2010, 499 service personnel were killed in Afghanistan. I wonder what public sentiment would be if that total was closer to the 14,000 back at home.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gun_violence_in_the_United_Stat... http://icasualties.org/oef/
[+] [-] lifeguard|13 years ago|reply
example:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8QjZY3WiO9s
[+] [-] lifeguard|13 years ago|reply
Good luck with that.
[+] [-] 300bps|13 years ago|reply
He also said that the printer used to make his gun costs about $8,000 but that people were reporting making a working gun with as low as a $2,000 printer.
http://m.bbc.co.uk/news/technology-22478310
[+] [-] astrodust|13 years ago|reply
Like a home-made zip gun it's quite dangerous to use, and liable to malfunction in all kinds of ways harmful to the user.
[+] [-] shpxnvz|13 years ago|reply
I share this only to illustrate that this technology is not enabling a radical new ability to produce cheap personal-use weapons, but more of an (expensive) prototype evolutionary step in the process.
In addition, possibly in contrast to this printed design, a home made receiver that is properly surface-hardened after machining is fully as capable and safe as any other receiver manufactured to the TDP.
[+] [-] rickyc091|13 years ago|reply
PrintrBot+ printing + superfine resolutions http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jyrP4LWc0yk
[+] [-] Zoepfli|13 years ago|reply
1- crime where a shot is fired
2- gun
3- gun creation
4- gun 3d file
5- somebody supplying you this file
6- the magnet directory giving you a link to the file supplier
7- the link hash giving you a link to the magnet directory
Can a 40 char string be illegal?
[+] [-] mpyne|13 years ago|reply
The U.S.-based code could then be distributed within the U.S. since ITAR is an export control only. The sheer ridiculousness of the whole thing eventually helped lead to legalizing useful crypto in the U.S. I guess we'll see what happens here.
[+] [-] anExcitedBeast|13 years ago|reply
[+] [-] Zikes|13 years ago|reply
I don't understand why this is so reactionary. People have been (very publicly) attempting to make a working 3D printable gun for years, and only now that it's finally happened the appropriate government agency has decided to explore the legal implications?
[+] [-] mikeyouse|13 years ago|reply
Defense Distributed has an active federal license to manufacture and distribute firearms. By posting blueprints online, it's very likely they've violated the conditions of that license.
From ITAR, what qualifies as sensitive:
Further clarification: How it can be in violation of law: Possible punishment entails: Their blueprints clearly qualify as sensitive, any download traffic from overseas is enough to prove they distributed to 'foreign persons'. The political calculus could save them since it would appear like Obama is trying to ban guns even though Distributed Defense is clearly in violation of federal law.I hope for their sake, there was no download activity from Iran, Cuba, North Korea, etc...
[+] [-] BashiBazouk|13 years ago|reply
It seems like this is more of a novelty than anything useful.
[+] [-] anExcitedBeast|13 years ago|reply
This is a big deal because 1) this is one of the first weapons designed from the ground up to be printed. Most printed firearms based on existing tech break easily because they weren't designed to be built with the materials you can print with. Over the next several years better and better firearms will be designed. In this way it is important the same way the very first shitty light bulb was important. 2) this addresses the still very unanswered question about what options governments have to restrict speech and international distribution of information over the Internet.
[+] [-] sageikosa|13 years ago|reply
[+] [-] Finster|13 years ago|reply
[+] [-] TomGullen|13 years ago|reply
[+] [-] gasull|13 years ago|reply
Those who want to harm other people find the means to do it. Let's focus on the roots of violence, not the means.
[+] [-] saraid216|13 years ago|reply
[+] [-] deadsy|13 years ago|reply
[+] [-] samfisher83|13 years ago|reply
[+] [-] egeozcan|13 years ago|reply
[+] [-] Zenst|13 years ago|reply
1) If such a gun was used in a crime, would bullet rifeling patterns be usable to tie up the shot fired to the plastic barrel gun and let alone the ability to dispose of said gun with a simple lighter.
2) Concerns about it only having a metal firing pin and with that how hard would it be to use say another material for the firing pin like graphite or a the like - only needs to fire one shot
I also understand why this project was done, it was a challange and we like challanges.
But as other have said, it is a simple type of gun that is the form that can be made by anybody wishing to make such a zip gun, still need ammunition.
What the concerns are is they have created a form of weapon that can be produced as easily as a photograph and that is just the tip of the concerns.
I will say that personaly whilst making a printable gun was something that was going to happen, giving out the blueprints for anybody to use and abuse was perhaps akin to writing expliot code and releaseing into the wild for any script kiddy to use and abuse with there click-run mentality.
The sad part is that people pushing out such blueprints for such printers will only mean that down the line such printers will get taxed and curtailed and effect those who mean no harm and the type of people who given a nuke button infron of them would resist in pressing it as they know the concequences.
As soon as a crime is commited with such a gun they will be banned and the 3d printer market will get more controled by legislation. Which is sad when such vigor is not bestowed upon normal guns.
Facts are guns do bad things in bad hands so the net result is they are outlawed in many countries and championed as rights in others. So if anything this highlights the issue with guns and not 3D printers, though I suspect the Rifle associations of the World will not defend 3D printers if they start to be restricted over this issue.
As an aside nukes are illegal, yet if somebody posted blueprints to make one, well that would pan out badly. Yet on some level this is just the same.
I applaud that somebody did and proved it was viable, I'm personaly not happy they gave out the blueprints in a form that enable people who do not understand the issues free access to them. Most will be good people, but not all and that is the crux of concerns however you look at them. So with that this is akin to releaseing 0-day expliot code into the wild in a point and click form.
[+] [-] phreeza|13 years ago|reply
I am no expert, but from what I understand, 3D printing is still far from being a 'click-and-run' type of experience.
[+] [-] fudged71|13 years ago|reply
I'd much rather see the world embrace 3D printing than fear it. Talk about "what we can print" after we all have access to 3D printers. We aren't there yet.
[+] [-] sageikosa|13 years ago|reply
Would any one file describing a single fashionable part be in violation also?
[+] [-] lifeguard|13 years ago|reply
One can not create a riffled barrel out of plastic. This is a $20k zip gun.
"Within production quality firearms, pistol and rifle barrels have tiny grooves cut inside of them. The grooves do not run straight, however are curved slowly throughout the length of the barrel. This technique is called rifling. Rifling causes the bullet to spin as it passes through the barrel. The spinning assists in stabilizing the bullet and making the gun more accurate. "
http://www.gunslot.com/blog/how-make-gun-common-materials-se...
[+] [-] hga|13 years ago|reply
And some of the use cases are the same, e.g. you can use it to "liberate" far more useful weapons.
[+] [-] acomjean|13 years ago|reply
They'll also be the home of plans for all copyrighted StarWars and other figurines.
Be interesting to see if they can stop the spread of those plans. I doubt it though.
[+] [-] unknown|13 years ago|reply
[deleted]
[+] [-] Nux|13 years ago|reply
[+] [-] jff|13 years ago|reply
[+] [-] knowaveragejoe|13 years ago|reply
[+] [-] ttrreeww|13 years ago|reply
[+] [-] rollo_tommasi|13 years ago|reply
[+] [-] Zikes|13 years ago|reply
I know it's a tired old saying, but the honest truth is that guns do not kill people, people kill people. Once you realize that, you realize that 3D printable guns are not a danger justifying "extreme prison terms".
[+] [-] egeozcan|13 years ago|reply
[+] [-] jabbernotty|13 years ago|reply
How about reasonable prison terms?
That could end up being no time at all.