3D Printers

Crowd-funding to Buy a 3D printer in the Dominican Republic

Luis Liriano, a chemical engineer student in the Dominican Republic, knows that the potential of 3D printing to aid technological advancement for social benefit is becoming increasingly recognized. Now, Luis is aiming to buy a RepRap home 3D printer and is sourcing the funding on Indiegogo — USD$1,750 — to do so in order to “bring it [to the Dominican Republic] and share it with others. I want to do workshops and get people involved, giving them the necessary tools and knowledge abut RepRaps and 3d printing.” Luis’ home nation is a country that suffers from marked income inequality: the poorest 50% of the population receives less than 20% of GDP, whilst the richest 10% enjoys nearly 40% of GDP.

Comment on the character or intentions of Luis Liriano cannot be made with certitude by a writer half the world away, but the economy of the Dominican Republic is, as he would know, currently limited to commodities such as tobacco, sugar, gold, ferronickel, orientated around mining and a diminishing textiles industry, and, more positively a rising tourism sector. Open source culture was recognized by the leader of the opposition in the United Kingdom Ed Miliband yesterday (including Arduino and Raspberry Pi) as having progressive democratizing effect and enabling a rejuvenation in Science Technology, Engineering and Manufacturing (STEM) – areas that the Dominican Republic’s economy would analogously benefit from.

Whilst the cynical may occasionally comment on Crowd-funding campaigns that seek funds for 3D printer stock as simply seeking to acquire a possession for themselves, there is little doubt that awareness of the altruistic potential of the technology is becoming increasingly widespread. A few hours before writing this piece I was sifting through the reactions of the often-cynical commentators of an international publication regarding NASA’s announcement of their project to use 3D-bio-printer to develop new food for astronauts, with the trickle-down effect of reducing the cost of production for printing food at home, a story I covered on Wednesday.

NASA’s previous R&D into food for astronautics has given society nutritionally enriched baby food and the guidelines for food quality used by the US food regulatory body. Whilst some may feel inclined to be quick to discard the iniative as a ‘$125,000 project for mutant pizza’ in hard pressed economic times, the understandable atmosphere of current concern about finance can easily blinker even the most optimistic of minds to the future social benefit of a relatively small investment made today. That lead politicians in some of the world’s most developed economies, and the world’s most advanced technology institutions such as NASA and DARPA (see DARPA’s MENTOR 3D printers for schools initiative) are now beginning to speak of home production technology’s shows the extent of influence that the Maker Movement, open source culture and specific projects such as RepRap are having.

At the time of writing, Liriano’s IndieGoGo campaign has just kicked off, with 54 days left and with USD$1689 to go.