Great Piece About the State of Modern Action Figures

[ctc]

>when did things stop being cool on their own merit and have to be FORCED to be cool?

1988.

Funny thing; I can see people of the future gettin' all nostalgic for THIS sort of thing. IN the same way we all gt a giggle out of Disco, or 80's hair.

*shudder*

Don C.

[spamn]

Things are going to get strange soon. In the coming decades toy collecting will cease to resemble anything like its current state. Imagine, when high-end 3D printers that are able to replicate different materials are as ubiquitous as the inkjet next to your computer, you're going to be able to send and receive toys by email. Nowadays, if I want customized Megos or SuperPowers, I have to commission or make them myself. But soon we'll be able to design them easily in a program and print them out. And if you want a repro of something, you'll be able to scan it with a laser and print out an exact copy, with mold lines and even slight paint variations perfectly replicated. Files of copies will be available to download for free. Monetarily speaking, "originals" will always have value, but it will be vastly reduced when there are a glut of perfect 3D copies available to anyone.

I wonder about that - I'm seriously considering investing in one of the home 3d printer sets, and possibly a homebrew CNC machine, all of which cost around the price of a computer. Though what holds me back is my lack of proficciency for 3d software. That, and the home products are a few generations away from being able to do nice smooth surfaces.

However:

The materials these things use may not be suitable for play, and the issue of paint and coloring still need to be addressed. Not to mention automated sewing of cool outfits, though that's mitigated some by using printers to print on fabric to switch from complicated patterns to bodysuits.

So while the day is coming, we're easily over a decade away from being desktop toy manufacturers.

[Sandman9580]

I wonder about that - I'm seriously considering investing in one of the home 3d printer sets, and possibly a homebrew CNC machine, all of which cost around the price of a computer. Though what holds me back is my lack of proficciency for 3d software. That, and the home products are a few generations away from being able to do nice smooth surfaces.

However:

The materials these things use may not be suitable for play, and the issue of paint and coloring still need to be addressed. Not to mention automated sewing of cool outfits, though that's mitigated some by using printers to print on fabric to switch from complicated patterns to bodysuits.

So while the day is coming, we're easily over a decade away from being desktop toy manufacturers.

Yeah, it's a way's off. To make good parts you have to smooth them out and then probably cast them in resin for durability. So it would have limited applications. But the technology will improve quickly--you may want to hold off awhile til it improves and gets cheaper?

The futurist Ray Kurzweil was talking about this once, and he said something like, "imagine purchasing an appliance like a toaster, and having it emailed to you. Now imagine you can email the toast." It'll be like living on Star Trek. And leaving aside the heady real-world implications (don't want to get too off-topic here), how will that affect the whole "collector-nostalgia" thing? In the future will grown-ups who are kids today want to own their original toys as much, knowing they can just "print out" perfect reproductions? The answer is probably yes... but it will be different. To hit it closer to home, think how your conception of vintage Mego has changed in the wake of EMCE Star Trek and POTA. Now imagine you can reproduce any Mego. It doesn't mean anyone likes the vintage ones less, but it does change things.

There will always be desire for the real thing, though. Like nowadays anyone could print out an almost-perfect reproduction comic book if they wanted to, but I saw on the news yesterday someone just paid $1,000,000 for Action Comics #1! That really surprised me.