Is the practice of paying to use someone else’s legal property usually regarded as unclear or obscure? Whenever you download a song on iTunes, is it unclear or obscure to you why you have to pay $0.99-$1.29 per song? Well that is what Geoffrey Ingersol would have you believe as cites Enigma, of TorrentFreak.com. In, A Super Obscure Patent Now Blocks 3D Printing Of Weapons, Food, Prosthetics, Even Human Skin, Ingersol starts with the following, “The future of 3D printing was bright, until an obscure patent filed in 2007 passed just the other day.” It is my understanding that patents are set in place to protect proprietary rights. Getting a head start on fair and reasonable licensing should only be seen as obscure to persons who plan on unlawfully ripping and replicating 3D designs in the future, or has done so in the past. Do me a favor and follow this link to Cramer’s Soundboard page and push the ‘Sell, Sell, Sell’ button rapidly, because I’m not buying what Ingersol is selling.
This statement, to me, suggests that it is obscure for a company to patent their own legal property. Ingersol references Enigmax claiming that he/ she “goes into great detail” when discussing the print copying, movie, and music copying industries. I found no such documentation by Enigmax from the links provided in Ingersol’s post. The only evidence I did find was a single sentence stating the following,”During the last 20 years inkjet printers made an unholy mess of the short-run commercial print guy’s business, enabling just about anyone to print on anything from paper to plastics with a relatively tiny outlay” (Enigmax, TorrentFreak.com). The logic that accessibility hindered the print copy industry is valid, but the argument that the new patent being adapted will negatively affect the personal 3D printing industry, is half correct at best.
If Ingersol’s argument is that these patents will call for only licensed individuals to own and operate these complicated machines, then I may argue that having a professional operate these machines might not be such a bad idea because it may bring down the costs of, for example, going to the dentist. In the case of 3D Systems (DDD), a 3D printing company that is revolutionizing the industry, recently released a new way of printing dental film that, as written by GlobeNewswire in 3D Systems’ VIDAR Digitizer makes Dentistry Today Readers’ Choice, retrieved from eresearch.fidelity.com, “…can also digitize x-ray films for integration into patients’ digital records to achieve a completely digital workflow at a fraction of the cost of digital panoramic solutions.” Therefore, lower operating costs for the business owner, could potentially relate to price savings in services and products for the consumer.
All companies have and will suffer from affordable internet and peer sharing, not only the film and music industries. Whenever I go to a printing store, nowadays, not only do I see the same printing options seen before the inkjet printer boom, but also a multitude of other internet services, hardware upgrades, and various other options that I might not have otherwise seen. Because more and more inkjet printers were affordable and accessible small printing, scratch that, all printing companies had to overcome, evolve, and set new policies in place to keep pace with innovation and adaptation to the market. Even the copying industry was affected by “affordable internet and peersharing.” We are now witnessing the early stages of that cycle once more with 3D printing and its evolution to become more accessible.
According to USLegal.com, “Proprietary information assets are critical to the success of many, perhaps most businesses,” and I think that any artist, business owner, or patent holder would agree. I found another article by Enigmax entitled Paramount Cease and Desist Targets 3D Printer ‘Pirate’ that talks about a designer who illegally distributes replicated objects/ merchandise from feature films and was issued a cease and desist order. Enigmax was defending the ‘pirate’ by ending with, “Hollywood created the replicator, but will they and other rightsholders be able to kill it?” (Enigmax, TorrentFreak.com) After reading Ingersol’s, A Super Obscure Patent Now Blocks 3D Printing Of Weapons, Food, Prosthetics, Even Human Skin, I get the perception that he himself see no wrong doing by the ‘pirate.’ His favorite source is Enigmax, of TorrentFreak.com; case and point.
Sources:
Ingersoll, G. BusinessInsider.com. A Super Obscure Patent Now Blocks 3D Printing Of Weapons, Food, Prosthetics, Even Human Skin. Retrieved 10/13/12 from: http://www.businessinsider.com/new-super-obscure-patent-blocks-3d-printing-of-weapons-food-prosthetics-even-human-skin-2012-10
Stock Quote Pricing via CNBC.com. Retrieved 10/13/12 from: http://data.cnbc.com/quotes/ddd
Enigmax. TorrentFreak.com. 3D Printer DRM Patent To Stop People Downloading a Car. Retrieved 10/13/12 from: http://torrentfreak.com/3d-printer-drm-patent-to-stop-people-downloading-a-car-121012/
Staff. US Legal. Proprietary Information Law & Legal Definition. Retrieved 10/13/12 from: http://definitions.uslegal.com/p/proprietary-information/
Staff. Globe Newswire via eResearch.Fidelity.com. 3D Systems’ VIDAR Digitizer Makes Dentistry Today Readers’ Choice. Retrieved 10/13/12 from: http://eresearch.fidelity.com/eresearch/goto/evaluate/news/basicNewsStory.jhtml?symbols=DDD&storyid=201210100921PRIMZONEFULLFEED10007886&provider=PRIMZONE&product=FULLFEED&hlinks=vnhl
Enigmax. TorrentFreak.com. Paramount Cease and Desist Targets 3D Printer ‘Pirate.’ Retrieved 10/13/12 from: http://torrentfreak.com/paramount-cease-and-desist-targets-3d-printer-pirate-110628/
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Billy Simpson 
