I’ve been in the 3D printing community for a couple of years. I watch both FMD and resin printing communities closely, and I try to actively participate. I like 3D printing – it is an exciting technology opening new possibilities, and it is a nice cross-over between mechanical-, electrical engineering, and computer science. There is still a lot to explore, improve and develop. But technology is improving every day, and most makers can contribute to the improvement. And what’s great is that nearly anyone can contribute towards the progress of the field, as 3D printing benefits a lot from open-source and open-hardware projects.
However, over the last few years, I started to note a few things that bother me a lot about the community, and I think they are holding the whole community and industry back. I believe that the beginning of a new year (2023) could be the right time to share my views and opinions, as it is the time when people make new-year resolutions.
I encourage you to read this, think about it, and reflect on your activity in the community. We, as a community, can do better! Also, if you disagree with me, I will be happy if you leave a comment below and explain your opinion. I would like to know how the community thinks and perceives itself. If you like and share my opinion, consider sharing this blog post on social media and with other members of the 3D-printing community so we can actually make a change!
We spread misinformation and support common myths in 3D printing!
I see very often that people believe stuff that isn’t true. I see very often that people give bad advice and people follow bad advice. People are also very passionate about giving this advice and are willing to argue.
I wish this stopped. It hurts us as a community and prevents us from significant advancements. It also makes our community hostile to newcomers as they are flooded with wrong, nonsensical, and pretty opinionated advice. They try it (as they believe in us), but nothing works; they get frustrated and give up. We might have just lost a valuable member and hurt our public image. It’s not just the newcomers who suffer from this behavior. The new and valuable information, techniques, and findings get lost in tons of garbage content out there.
To be honest, I perceive this more in the resin printing community. But I’ve seen this also in the FDM community, so it might be only possible that spend more time with resin printing, so I see this more often a, thus, perceive it more.
The list of concrete examples would be long, and I don’t want to make it and point fingers at people. If you don’t believe me, read Reddit, 3D printing FB groups, or comments under YouTube videos. See for yourself.
What steps can I take to make the community better?
We are a community, so I believe any change must come from the individuals. I’ve been thinking about what to do for a while, and I came up with the following credos I personally try to follow, and I encourage you to follow them too!
1: Clearly distinguish between what you know and what you think.
When we answer a question or present our findings, we often don’t indicate certainty of the information we provide. Therefore, everything they say seems like a fact, though it might be just an opinion or wild guess. Therefore, when we present information, we should always try to be as clear as possible about how certain we are about the information that we claim:
- If I know what I say is a verifiable fact, I present it as is, and I try to add at least a short reference to the source of information or short reasoning about why it is so.
- If I believe that what I present is true, but I cannot show it, I make sure I indicate so: e.g., “I believe that…”, “I think that… but I don’t have data to support it”, “I noticed that something happens, but I haven’t verified it by an experiment.”
- If I present a theory that is just based on gut feeling or came out of thin air, I make sure I indicate so: “My wild guess is that…”, “I don’t know, it’s just a guess based on experience.”
- If the information doesn’t fall into any of the categories above, I simply don’t respond to a question. Having no answer is much better than having a false answer presented as fact.
Having the indication of certainty in the text will allow us to quickly evaluate the text and understand what is a verifiable fact (and we can accept so) and what is a conjecture (what we have to be careful of). It should also help us to avoid a misunderstanding.
2: Don’t provide advice without explanation; if you are given advice without explanation, ask for it.
Whenever we present a fact, we should explain why it is true. I am not saying we should write long essays; instead, I think it is better to always link the original source. This will credit the original author, and we are sure we haven’t misinterpreted their explanation. And it’s less work for us.
The purpose of this credo is twofold:
- It gives credibility to your information/answer. The reader can understand things instead of blindly following them, and they can quickly evaluate whether the information is valuable.
- It is a safety check for us that we don’t make false statements. We shouldn’t post them if we cannot support or explain our claims. As they might be wrong.
This should apply to any content you make, whether answering a question, sharing your settings, writing a blog post, or making a YouTube video.
Similarly, if someone gives you advice without explanation, don’t be ashamed to ask for it. If they cannot explain it, then it is very probable that it is incorrect. If we see people giving bad advice, we should ask them for an explanation of why their advice is good.
3: If possible, don’t use Facebook Groups and Discord, as they are not indexed by search engines.
This might make me seem like an old and grumpy old-schooler, but I think that Facebook and Discord do more harm to us than they do good. Yes, those technologies are good for connecting people across the globe with the same interest, they are super interactive and quick, but they are not indexed by search engines like Google. That means that whatever you write there cannot be easily found. All the knowledge there gets lost and can only be found by someone who knows where to look. This is so wasteful!
I really like the culture of the original internet discussion, where it was familiar to search before asking. Searching for information yourself is often quicker than asking and waiting for a response, and the medium isn’t spammed by the same information repeatedly. There is much less human labor involved, all the fact-checking and linking to original sources is simpler. Therefore, we can only focus on new and interesting stuff. Also, there is a single place where the discussion for a given topic is organized so any notes from the commenter won’t get lost.
This is why I like when people doing research or building a project write a standard blog or wiki page instead of just having a Facebook page or Discord server. That way, you can find their work when looking for a solution to your problem. Also, all discussions and new ideas on the topic are in a single place, so you can read them all.
I perceive Reddit as a good compromise as it is indexed and has mechanisms to promote good answers. Similarly, Twitter is indexed but has limited space to express yourself. Though I don’t like YouTube videos that much for sharing new findings, they are well-indexed by Google. So they work quite well. Unfortunately, there are not many creators making videos with quality content.
4: Don’t be lazy to read and to think.
The last credo is evident, but I was shocked at how many people suffer from this. If someone presents you with information, please, take the time to read it whole or watch the entire video. Numerous people have just read a headline and argued that the information provided doesn’t solve their problem. We shouldn’t be lazy, and we should encourage people to not be lazy. I know it is harsh, but I think we shouldn’t pre-process the information for people that deliberately ignored most of the resources provided. I think we should encourage them to go back and read and watch.
Final remarks
I hope this letter didn’t sound too negative – it shouldn’t. I hope it was more encouragement to do things better and be a better community. There are already great members (though there are very few of them) that present their information backed by an explanation (let’s say “according to my credos”?), and they are my great inspiration. Therefore I would like to give them public kudos here. Note that I might not list somebody out there doing things right; these are just the people that I follow:
- Stefan Hermann from CNC Kitchen. He runs a fantastic Youtube channel. He presents the information well, with great explanations and insight, and his videos are approachable. Also, he has a transcript of his videos in written form – you can quickly search through that! Also, he concludes good research.
- Thomas Sanladerer also runs a Youtube channel. Similarly to Stefan, he presents many topics as approachable and also encourages people to think and understand. His reviews are nice and in-depth.
- Adam “Vector3D” also runs a Youtube channel. I like that he, to some extent, aims for reproducible setups and backs up his research with a lot of data.
- The last one is James Hoffman. Yes, that “coffee guy.” He has nothing to do with 3D printing. But I think he can serve as a great example and inspiration for us. On the one hand, he is very opinionated and expresses his ideas strongly, but on the other hand, he cares about explaining why he thinks so. He back his claims with data and is not afraid to admit that he was wrong.
As I said in the introduction, I hope we can make a better 3D printing community in 2023. If you agree with me, please share this letter. If you have any thoughts or if you disagree with me, please, let me know in the comments!
Recent news: My open letter to the 3D-printing community
I love the 3D-printing community, but I think there is room for improvement. Let's get better in 2023! Read the full letter.
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Well said. This post mirrors my own thinking on the subject very well. When friends are curious about resin printing, one of the first warnings I give them is that almost all of the information they will encounter on the subject should be considered “folk wisdom,” to be taken with a grain of salt, and that truly well-tested “best-practice” and real expertise are extremely hard to come by in this space.
I also think this appears to be worse in the resin printing community than in FDM, though like you I spend much more time in the former so may also have a degree of selection bias in my perception. If it is true, though, I see two main reasons for it. The first is simply that home FDM printing has been around much longer than home resin printing, so the community has had more time to mature and naturally insulate itself from misinformation. The second, though, is that home FDM printing is a much closer analog to industrial FDM printing than home MSLA printing is to industrial SLA printing, and that research and best-practice from the industrial side more easily finds its way to home use with FDM than it does with SLA.
On a fundamental level, home FDM printers aren’t significantly different from their industrial counterparts; in a general sense they’re just smaller and built with less expensive components. On the resin side, bottom-up SLA printing using LCD masking is pretty much exclusively the realm of home printing, with industrial machines more likely to be projecting into resin with lasers or DLP, to be using a top-down orientation that sinks the print into a deep resin vat rather than peeling it off a film, and/or to rely on proprietary chemistry for resin or key components (ex: Carbon’s oxygen-permeable film). Industrial SLA printers are also not likely to be manufactured and sold as just the machinery itself but tend to be leased as full-service operations, with the companies behind them providing not just the printer but a full ecosystem of proprietary software, service, and supplementary machines (post-processing, etc). So, to whatever degree their research into best-practices might be applicable at all for home printing, the results are more likely to be kept close-to-the-vest as “trade secret” proprietary information, as that expertise is part of what they are selling along with their printers.
To my mind that may explain why we have such a lack of reliable information in the resin printing space, but what can be done about it? I think the work you do on this blog is tremendous in pushing forward the real research, using repeatable experimentation, that the home MSLA community truly needs. I look forward to seeing your findings going forward, but even more than that, I’m hopeful that others may be inspired to take up the call and help fill our information gaps the same way you have been doing.
The suggestions you have for how to fix things are also good ones. I’ve already adopted the first point and really wish others would do the same. Prefacing any advice or answers you give with “In my experience…” is a simple step towards framing the discussion accurately, and making it clear that real answers in this space often aren’t well understood and tend to be built on a collection of anecdotal observation (or, as I put it above, “folk wisdom”).
I’m also a bit torn about the way new members in the community are directed towards popular YouTubers to get started. There really isn’t much expertise in the well-known MSLA YouTube space. Whether it’s presenters who just don’t really understand their topic very well, or it’s just the limitations of a format that incentives quick turnaround and strong opinion over in-depth research and nuance, I think quite a lot of the misinformation and bad advice floating around the community can be traced back to YouTube. In the past I felt like most of these presenters were ultimately doing more good than harm; fun personalities and snappy production values attract new people to the hobby, building the market for MSLA printing, which benefits all of us. That the personalities seemed to have little expertise beyond a beginner understanding of the technology didn’t seem to be much of a problem, if their audience is mostly beginner users as well. I guess I had assumed that folks getting into this hobby would perhaps lean on YouTube advice to get started, but later out-grow it when they realize the emperor has no clothes, and graduate to following sources with a higher level of expertise. Now, however, that seems to have been a naive assumption; the high-expertise sources of content are very few and far between, and in that vacuum the slickly-produced but misinformation-spreading channels have been elevated to “expert” status by large portions of the community. The amount of times I’ve seen people on forums quoting nonsense from a YouTuber as fact is pretty concerning. So now I cringe when I see a newcomer directed to YouTube for starting advice. I just wish we had a better resource for them, though. This is a major vector of misinformation but I’m really not sure what to do about it.
One thing that I think would be helpful, in general, is attempting to re-frame how people think about MSLA printing. FDM has very clear roots in robotics and in CNC machines often used in manufacturing. SLA printing, on the other hand, seems to me to trace its lineage more clearly back to a different type of machine: the photographic enlarger used in dark rooms throughout the last century. Whereas the FDM printer might be thought of as a CNC mill that adds material rather than removing it, the SLA printer, in my view, makes the most sense as a photographic enlarger that can stack exposures on top of one-another. This sort of conceptual framing should make clear many of the differences that perhaps need to get more attention in how we think about and research best practices for SLA printing. For example, seeing an SLA printer as an enlarger that works in 3D should make it clear that the topics of chemistry and optics will be key subjects of interest, and yet we generally see those take a back seat in favor of mechanical engineering and electronics. Perhaps this is just because the crossover with FDM printing means our community has more expertise in the latter subjects, so that’s where they’ve applied their energies, but I think to a large degree that crossover is also just approaching the machines in a way that fundamentally misses some key aspects of the technology. “Conceptual framing” is perhaps a subtle point, but it’s something I’d love to see shift in the future.
In any case, this response has already gone on much longer than I’d intended. At the end of the day, the best tool for fighting misinformation is real information. And to that end, the work you’ve been doing on this blog is truly the point of the spear in that fight. I truly appreciate the work you’ve been doing here, and look forward to what you’ll have for us in 2023. Happy New Year!
Thanks for taking the time to write that lengthy, well thought out and presented comment, you covered a great deal there very accurately!
I won’t leave a lengthy comment.
I just want to say “thank you” for this, and I fully agree with what you say.
Everyone should do better!
Great comments, though they may unfortunately fall on deaf ears. I appreciate your posts and your commitment to putting out tested information.
I think what you are doing is great and very unselfish, I know you can sleep food at night.
I think your advice could be to the world about everything they believe, not just resin printing and online groups.
“Clearly distinguish between what you know and what you think” is amazing advice for everyone but most people don’t make a distinction, you could even say that most people don’t make a distinction between believing and knowing.
What I’ve learned from talking to people about where their beliefs come from (family, friends etc) is that people are generally very lose with their definition of fact and of what they believe. Most beliefs are rooted in persons or people groups, if a respected group or person beliefs something they will blindly follow this. (Think political parties or religions but also Facebook/reddit groups) It’s a shortcut to get to the truth but the vast majority of people use this for most beliefs they see as truth. (And thus there is very little actual fact checking)
A personal example, my parents are very anti-establishment but most of the beliefs they argue are often finally rooted in people or books and they will reference them as fact. They will not necessarily always argue with facts but reference the people and that if I really want to understand them I have to read their books (And you can’t argue with a book if you disagree of course..) When I talk to the rest of my family which is very pro establishment and most are religious, they believe what is most mainstream or what is accepted in their communities.
They both make the same mistake and are often incapable of arguing with real arguments because neither side actually understands the reasoning behind their beliefs.
Great job of trying to get more people to think critically!
As we enter a new year, it’s an opportune time to reflect on how we can improve as a community. The call to action in the open letter to the 3D printing community is an excellent reminder that there is always room for growth and improvement, even in a field as innovative as 3D printing.
One of the most crucial aspects of becoming better is to prioritize sustainability in our practices. As the 3D printing industry continues to grow, it’s essential that we take steps to reduce our environmental impact. This could mean using recycled materials, optimizing the use of energy, and reducing waste.
Additionally, it’s important to work towards greater inclusivity and diversity within the 3D printing community. We should strive to create a welcoming and supportive environment that encourages people of all backgrounds and identities to participate and contribute.
Furthermore, knowledge sharing is also vital for our growth as a community. We should continue to collaborate and share information and resources with each other. This will help us to improve our processes and develop new innovations that benefit everyone.
In summary, the open letter to the 3D printing community serves as an inspiring call to action. By prioritizing sustainability, inclusivity, and knowledge sharing, we can work towards becoming better as a community in 2023 and beyond.