online selling/buying stl 3d print files?

[NCB]

On 21/05/2020 at 07:33, 55020 said:

 

I seem to be totally at odds with the world.  If I do something for pleasure, which is what this hobby is to me, why should I expect financial gain or reward for that enjoyment?  If I spend time developing something in CAD for the fun of it, I have no internal desire to find recompence from others for the time spent.  I would spend the time no matter what, so why would I "count my labour cost"?

As I stated, I do seem to be on my own with this viewpoint.  Obviously I'm the mug :-)

 

 

Steve

 

 

You are not alone. I am retired, and absolutely intend to stay that way. I have no interest in doing anything remotely commercial. I model for fun. If something I do is of use to somebody else then that's great. The only qualifaction is that I own the copyright; use by others is a licence to use. It also means I don't owe the taxman anything.

 

I take a fair number of photographs most of which end up on Geograph, where they are available for anybody to use under a Creative Commons license. I get a kick out when one appears on the BBC website, or similar, properly accredited. Same idea.

[Bochi]

There is a middle ground on files which is to run a Kickstarter-type campaign for them.

Say you are offering a range of Caledonian wagon kits (hint hint). You have developed a series of files for them: some are just little tweaks on each other, some are very different from each other.

You calculate how much would be a decent recompense and you set that as your funding goal. So perhaps £30 for the set of files, you want to sell a minimum of 300 packages, so you set a goal of £3000. When the target is reached, you will send the files to your customers.

This seems to work for a number of fantasy miniature producers where it's just one or two people with a home-based cottage industry. Perhaps they have a bigger market. If so then perhaps you need an open-ended subscriber campaign so that you are prepared to wait six months before getting enough orders to make it worth your while. This is of course like some of the dealer campaigns for new locomotives where they are, in the first stages, testing interest.

I do think people can be a bit precious about the sanctity of their files. The major producers of fantasy/wargaming terrain seem to be doing all right - I've never passed on the many files I've bought and I have never seen anybody offering them. The two biggest providers (Printable Scenery and Fat Dragon Games) have licensing systems to enable people to sell models on eBay or Etsy or tweaked and modified files via online sites such as DriveThruRPG.

 

[Chris hndrsn]

On 21/05/2020 at 05:54, 55020 said:

I actually think there's an opportunity to look at sharing STL files for free.  I am personally happy to share files that I design, which are done for personal reasons.  Why would I feel the need to "sell" them?  If I can offer files for free and then receive others for free, is that not better?

 

Because you don't want someone, a business, to make a profit from your efforts in creating the CAM file. Which is what would happen.

[monkeysarefun]

11 hours ago, Chris hndrsn said:

 

Because you don't want someone, a business, to make a profit from your efforts in creating the CAM file. Which is what would happen.

 

This is a huge problem in the model ship world. Someone will spend many many hours researching a vessel and draw up extensive  plans. They will sell them either online or through a business for a reasonable cost to recoup the effort they put in but inevitably it is only  matter of time before a lasercut wooden kit appears based upon them, originating in Russia or China. 

Edited June 30, 2020 by monkeysarefun

[JCL]

This has been an interesting read. I did have a shop on Shapeways, which I eventually closed down because I didn’t like their pricing or lack of respect for store owners. I used the shop to pay for the prototyping of the next model so that I never offered a model that hadn’t been tested. I’m the one that has been working with Chris P Bacon, and as he says, prototyping is key - you never know if something will work or not until you try it. Depending on tolerances, could be less than a millimetre out with a splasher and not notice until your printed model came back and the wheels don’t turn around.

 

With this in mind, when buying, as long as the price is what I want to pay, I would only buy an STL if

- I’d read good things about the designer,

- the designer supported their model. For example, if it was found to be inaccurate or didn’t fit the recommended mechanism, they would adjust the model,

- I could spin the model around so I can see it from all angles - important for more complex models, especially if I’m thinking of marrying it up to a chassis,

- I could see a printed version of the model,

- I knew the model was not too big for my printer (my printer isn’t a bad size, but still can’t easily fit in a 6 wheel carriage),

- I was able to run more than one print.
 

As anyone with a 3D printer will know, being restricted to a single print wouldn’t fly because there are any number of things that could go wrong - run out of resin, power cut, bad support structure producing a warped print, printer too cold, earth tremor (not likely in the UK, but happens where I am from time to time), forget to put the build plate back in, etc, etc.

 

On the stls, there’s just no way of stopping them from being copied. For my sins, I am in a couple of 3D printing Facebook groups, and I think every month there is a tale of someone selling an STL of a figure which is then uploaded to Thingiverse by the buyer so that it can be given away to others. I’ve read it’s notoriously difficult to get those models taken back down.

 

One thing, I do currently have a much smaller Shapeways shop than before, but only because I was asked if I could make a couple of items available again. I haven’t bothered reuploading the locos that I had on there they wouldn’t pass the current tests and it’s not worth my time checking them and redoing them.

 

All in all, if I was into selling stl files, I’d look at what @oorail is doing.

[simonmcp]

I was a graphic designer and used to design websites. Someone took a logo that I had designed and used it on his website. All it took to stop it being used was a, totally legal in the UK, bill for £1,000.00 per day for the use of my artwork to the website hosting company and it was taken down in minutes. I imagine that would work for STLs as well. The Chinese copying problems even Microsoft can't prevent. You could always do a deal with the Getty foundation, they are very hot on getting royalties. Simon

[neilkirby]

 

Hi,

I believe Getty have also been known to try to charge people for copyright which is not theirs! IIRC  a New York photoghrapher receive a copyright bill from Getty for their own photo, which they had not licensed to Getty.

 

Neil

[simonmcp]

2 hours ago, neilkirby said:

 

Hi,

I believe Getty have also been known to try to charge people for copyright which is not theirs! IIRC  a New York photoghrapher receive a copyright bill from Getty for their own photo, which they had not licensed to Getty.

 

Neil

That is similar to what happened to me back in the 1980s, it was digital artwork not a photograph and not with Getty, but it was cheaper to pay the bill than fight it.

 

Simon

[Paul_in_Ricky]

Interesting to see that Design Scan Print 3D have just started offering their figures as digital downloads;

http://www.designscanprint3d.co.uk/
I think the pricing is acceptable, at about £4 per figure.

 

I've bought a couple of their 16mm figures and the design is good, but the print quality left a lot to be desired. I assume that using a good resin printer would solve that issue. Being able to edit the files would, I hope, allow fine tuning of pose to suit purpose and location too.

Edited July 20, 2020 by Paul_in_Ricky