Information Technology Reference
In-Depth Information
11.5.5
Dystopian Scenarios: Fabrication, Spam, Hacking,
and Biological Warfare
While we are likely a long way off from matter replicators capable of creating
nanomachines that can convert entire cities into dust (Transmetropolitan), there are
still plenty of potentially harmful effects that we can imagine on our horizon of
home fabrication. Already we are starting to have to deal with the legal and ethical
issues that 3D printed handguns are raising.
15
Untraceable, unregistered, plastic fi re-
arms are just the tip of the iceberg when it comes time to envision the dark future of
these technologies; however, for this discussion we would like to fi rst consider a
more mundane (and we believe much more likely) annoyance.
11.5.5.1
3D Printed Spam
Elena is woken up in the middle of the night by the sound of her Maker as it whirrs
away on an elaborate print job. “Did I forget to disconnect it before bed?” she asks
herself. This is not the fi rst time this has happened, but she had hoped that her new
message fi lters would prevent the machine from wasting power and feedstock on
these things. She stumbles out of bed and pads down the hall to her home offi ce,
where the printer is steadily churning away. On the print bed she can already see
the inevitable object taking shape and she rolls her eyes in annoyance. It is a
comically oversized set of male genitals. Emblazoned along one side is a web
address and a message (in broken English) informing her that she too could satisfy
the ladies in her life, if she orders this secret herbal formula today! The printer
dome pops open, and she removes the fabricated penis. Sighing she tosses it into a
bin under the desk marked “Recycle,” where it joins a half dozen similarly priapic
items in various rainbow hues. “How the hell did I get onto this list?!” she wonders,
as she heads back to bed. Tomorrow she will need to upgrade her spam fi lters.
There is no reason to think that 3D printing will not be subject to the same
unwanted commercial messaging as every other networked technology. In the
1980s, as fax machines proliferated, the practice of sending “Junk Faxes” became a
common annoyance. Spam e-mails have existed as long as there have been computer
networks. We can imagine a future where networked home fabrication systems fall
victim to a whole host of creative intrusions. As we considered in our example of the
malfunctioning replicator “food slot” in Star Trek, unwanted and uncontrolled fab-
rication isn't a problem that can be easily ignored. There is no harm to allowing
spam e-mail messages to build up in your inbox, but allowing a growing pile of
physical objects to build up in your offi ce can become a serious problem, especially
when you consider that each object requires physical materials to construct and
represents a signifi cant time and energy investment.
