The past two years has seen a huge number of 3D printing repositories flood the market, each one seeking to distinguish itself from the rest and invoking a variety of strategies to do so. Launzer.com, for instance, sells only branded content, from such companies as Warner Bros., while Shapeways hosts countless designer storefronts, in which 3D printed designs are sold for a range of prices, sometimes exceeding the $100-mark. And sites like YouMagine and Thingiverse host 3D printable files for free. 3DShare is the latest entrant into 3D printable e-commerce setting itself apart with simplicity and personal freedom of expression, comparing itself simultaneously to the Apple App Store and reddit.
3DShare’s “App Store for 3D files” has just launched today, hoping to streamline the process of selling 3D printable files with an easy pricing scheme, just like the app store (when it initially took off). 3DShare’s Mark Joseph explains their pricing system, “I’m happy paying 99¢ for an app. Paying $20 for something is going to make me think twice. We make your designs available at 99¢ and, like the appstore, 70¢ of each download goes direct to your pocket. [The remaining] 29¢ covers payment processing, site costs, etc. As the volume of 3D file printing explodes, the potential market for your designs explode. Think about it: 10,000 downloads equals $7,000. Now, think about 100,000 downloads!”
Of course, the App Store has since blossomed into a bouquet of apps of varying prices. Still, the 99¢ store has been profitable for some time, selling discounted and discontinued products. The pricing model, then, maybe an appealing one. What’s more appealing to me, however, is 3DShare’s attitude towards freedom of expression. Mark also describes itself as the “reddit of 3D printing”, with Mark saying, “We don’t want to impose any limitations on people’s imaginations. We want to engage in the same level of diverse discussions and creations that reddit has done. If somebody is old enough to 3D print molten plastic using some pretty hardcore machinery, we’re of the impression that they can find sites like ‘dongiverse’ or more extreme on the internet. This is why we have the ‘Anything Goes’ section. Obviously we’re not condoning the sharing of anything illegal – we just want to build on a value based open model.”
To me, an “Anything Goes” section would be a welcome place for such beautifully creative works as, say, a 3D printable goatse and tubgirl. When I couldn’t get those models printed via the traditional services, I was disappointed to learn the lengths to which censorship was invoked over little cartoony figurines. Though 3DShare doesn’t make it any easier for me to have the files printed, it does give goatse and tubgirl’s artist, DotCX, a new venue to sell zir work.
At the moment, 3DShare is only selling the 3D models themselves, but Mark tells me that the site has plans to integrate a 3D printing feature, in which customers can have the items printed through a third-party services, and is in talks with 3D Hubs and i.materialise to do so. Then, 3DShare will evolve the current designer profiles on the site into full-fledged design shops with completely customizable storefronts. In regards to the reddit-style attitude of the site, Mark tells me, “We are yet to decide how flexible to be with the rules in shops, but we are determined to be the ‘3D marketplace for designers’.”
I hope that 3DShare is able to maintain its open mind towards designs because, to me, it’s that that allows 3DShare to really distinguish itself from the rest of the printables marketplaces and I can’t wait to see what sort of work bursts onto the 3DShare scene. To encourage that scene-bursting, 3DShare is giving $5-worth of credit to the first 1,000 designers that sign up to go towards downloading 3D printable designs. Mark says of the incentive, “We have a good number of designers on board already and it is our way of paying them back for all the hard work they do. Hopefully, it will also kickstart other designers into making their files exclusively available through 3DShare.”
