this post was submitted on 16 Aug 2026
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cross-posted from: https://lemmy.zip/post/69760899

So much for the constitution

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That's stupid. Let's just build our own with FOSS.

This really seems like it's just a way to get DRM onto printers to stop people from printing replacement parts or 'copyrighted' materials.

[–] N0t_5ure@lemmy.world 107 points 1 week ago (7 children)

This so broad and vague as to be unconstitutional. It's like mandating that computers have to have technology that prevents hate speech. A 3d printer, like a computer, a hammer, a pencil, or the myriad of other tools humans use is just a general tool that can be put to good or bad uses. It would be insane to require anti-skull bashing technology for hammers and it is crazy to burden 3d printer manufacturers to develop technology to try to do this. Moreover, 3d printers are just one way to make ghost guns. A better way may be just home CNC. Instead of additive technology laying down layers of plastic one by one, with home CNC you can take a block of metal and machine it out, subtractive technology. The bill does not impact home CNC. So dumb!

[–] willington@lemmy.dbzer0.com 3 points 6 days ago

But can you 3D print a guillotine?

Asking for a friend.

[–] WolfLink@sh.itjust.works 34 points 1 week ago

We should pass a law that all knives have to know what purpose they are being used for and should refuse to be used for stabbing or otherwise hurting people.

[–] tacosanonymous@mander.xyz 29 points 1 week ago* (last edited 1 week ago) (1 children)

And with machined metal, you might make something that can shoot more than one bullet that probably won’t explode in your face.

[–] Dookieman12@piefed.social 1 points 1 week ago

Are you somehow under the impression a 3D printed firearm will explode in your face?

[–] ColeSloth@discuss.tchncs.de 18 points 1 week ago

All part of why the Democrat party is only slightly smaller bags of shit than the Republican party. Neither one is worth a damn. It's all about control, power, and keeping rich.

[–] Johanno@feddit.org 10 points 1 week ago

What you don't understand is that this is only about guns on the surface. This will enable every 3d printer manufacturer to harvest tons of data from everyone. To a point where the printer can not work without a connection to the server for security reasons by law.

You could buy a metal pipe and fill it with gun powder and you have a cheaper and more robust gun than a 3d printer could ever build.

[–] Buffalox@lemmy.world 1 points 1 week ago* (last edited 1 week ago) (3 children)

mandating that computers have to have technology that prevents hate speech.

What a brilliant idea, let's get on it immediately. 🤣

Joking aside, you are 100% right.
Except I think the idea of printing a gun is to avoid detection in metal detectors.

[–] Delilah@lemmy.blahaj.zone 16 points 1 week ago

You do know that 3d printed guns are not 100% plastic, large chunks of them are just normal metal gun parts. I'm also wondering what you think bullets are made of?

Please don't repeat stupid shit like saying 3d printed guns go past metal detectors. It will hurt the 3d printing community.

[–] Glitchvid@lemmy.world 8 points 1 week ago (1 children)

The vast majority of these 3d printed guns use the fact that the registered "gun" is only a small part of the actual whole gun. You can buy barrels, magazines, slides, firing pins, etc, all mail order without any fuss — it's the part with the serial number that is actually the firearm and restricted. So if you print that part (which is often basically just a shell to hold the metal components in place) you have an unserialized gun that's basically just as good as one from a gun store.

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[–] Dookieman12@piefed.social 7 points 1 week ago

I think the idea of printing a gun is to avoid detection in metal detector

Wrong.

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[–] luthis@lemmy.nz 84 points 1 week ago (2 children)

They will do anything except properly regulate guns huh

[–] andrewrgross@slrpnk.net 35 points 1 week ago (2 children)

No, California already does lots of gun regulation.

If anything, I think this is the result of a culture in which they're looking for ways to do more when there's no much more they can really do without federal changes.

It's fucked up. California legislators just do not really care about surveillance or civil rights at this this point.

[–] frongt@lemmy.zip 31 points 1 week ago (1 children)

I think this is the result of a culture in which they're looking for ways to do more

Well, except for actually effective policies like better access to mental health care and reducing socioeconomic inequality. Because that would take actual effort.

[–] IronBird@lemmy.world 12 points 1 week ago* (last edited 6 days ago) (1 children)

but if we built a bunch of housing my property value might go down - average parasitic nimby

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[–] Dookieman12@piefed.social 11 points 1 week ago

I think this is the result of a culture in which they’re looking for ways to do more

All gun control is about controlling the actions of citizens who already abide by the law.

Poverty, unemployment, drug abuse, mental health, and income inequality are the causes of gun violence. Treat those root causes, and it doesn't matter how many guns there are.

If gun ownership directly translated to gun violence, Finland and Switzerland would have many times the rates of gun violence as the US. In those countries, the total number of guns owned might be smaller, but the overall percentage of people who own guns is nearly 100%. Those countries don't have the same problems with gun violence because they address the real root causes of gun violence.

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[–] Buffalox@lemmy.world 27 points 1 week ago* (last edited 1 week ago) (2 children)

That law is impossible to follow and moronic.
You can't prevent a new unknown designs to be printed, and my guess is those are pretty trivial to make. And there is guaranteed to be workarounds too. This is just enshittification by law.
My guess is that this law will not pass.

[–] Trampampoline@sh.itjust.works 4 points 1 week ago

It'll pass, it just won't matter outside of California and the corporate entities 3D printing there.

You can still print guns out of your heavily modified Ender 9999 covered in a trash bag.

[–] nulluser@lemmy.world 0 points 1 week ago (1 children)

My guess is that this law will not pass.

Reread the first 5 words of the headline.

[–] Buffalox@lemmy.world 25 points 1 week ago* (last edited 1 week ago) (1 children)

Sigh....

Now read a little further:

The bill must still pass through the California State Senate, and will pass through California governor Gavin Newsom's desk if it clears the Senate. Newsom can then either sign it into law, or veto it.

But I can see the people upvoting you didn't do that either. Sigh....
It's not my fault the headline is stupid and misleading. It has only passed 1 step out of 3.

[–] nulluser@lemmy.world 20 points 1 week ago (1 children)

Yep. That's not just a stupid headline. It's flat out wrong.

[–] Buffalox@lemmy.world 6 points 1 week ago
[–] tidderuuf@lemmy.world 26 points 1 week ago (1 children)

Now all the 3D printing bros get to experience what life is like as a firearm bro.

The laws are not so bad but it's the malicious compliance of retailers and manufacturers that will make your hobby nearly impossible.

Oh but if you have plenty of money there are no issues for you.

[–] DeadDigger@lemmy.zip 1 points 1 week ago (2 children)

Hm nah this is mostly about commercial printers. As a 3d printer hobbieist I can build it from the ground up so I wouldn't care much

[–] demonmariner@sh.itjust.works 0 points 5 days ago (1 children)

The mechanical hardware build is no problem, building a controller and firmware is a different matter. This legislation is all about the firmware.

I have some experience with 3d printing equipment but I'm not sure I could build a controller from the ground up. To be fair, I've never really looked into it so maybe it's easier than it seems.

[–] SarcasmIntended@lemmy.world 2 points 5 days ago* (last edited 5 days ago) (1 children)

You can buy a controller at any place that sells motors or Arduinos. None of my printers have their stock controller.

The firmware most controllers run is often a modified version of one of the different open source 3d printer firmwares (klipper, Marlin, etc)

You can even choose to compile and flash the firmware yourself (often just load bin file to sdcard and insert into board)

But all of that is moot because the controller and firmware are not capable of that level of processing. You would have to implement it on the slicer level, and even that wouldn't work because most of them are open source.

[–] masterspace@lemmy.ca 3 points 1 week ago* (last edited 1 week ago)

Most of the hobbyist 3D printer market is not people who think that building 3D printers is fun and their primary hobby, it's people who bought them to print other stuff for them.

It's literally the entire reason Bambu has shot to popularity so fast.

[–] givesomefucks@lemmy.world 20 points 1 week ago (3 children)

The real problem was always the grip being the serialized part of a firearm...

As long as that's true, firearm regulations are easy to circumvent.

"Fire Control Units" make more sense, but is still just kicking the can down the road. Eventually those would be home made too.

It's like racoon-proofing a trashcan, if you do it step by step, all you're doing is teaching raccoons to break into trash cans. If you start out secure enough, they never learn.

[–] Zak@lemmy.world 12 points 1 week ago

It's easy to find examples of homemade guns. Here's a blog full of them: https://www.thefirearmblog.com/blog/author/improguns/

Most of them are made with crude metalworking, not 3D printing. Making a quality firearm is difficult; making one that goes bang most times the trigger is pulled is not.

[–] AllNewTypeFace@leminal.space 3 points 1 week ago (2 children)

Somebody once suggested removing all restrictions on the sale and possession of firearms, but severely regulating ammunition.

[–] Trampampoline@sh.itjust.works 3 points 1 week ago (1 children)
[–] Septimaeus@infosec.pub 4 points 1 week ago (1 children)

TMK, while ammunition is somewhat regulated already, it’s even easier to manufacture with minimal resources. Hobbyists have been manufacturing ammunition for a very long time. In the short term, those manufacturers would fill in the demand gap left by factory ammo.

It would certainly make ammunition more expensive, and thus potentially curb unnecessary use, but a lot of that unnecessary use is a big predictor WRT safe use, so I’m not entirely sure the net effect would be positive in the long term either.

Also, as a general note…

Since fascist governments always seek a monopoly on violence, the fact that I’ve been pro gun control for a very long time hasn’t stopped me from turning my head on the issue.

Many comrades will undoubtedly disagree with me on this point, but:

I think now is not the time for leftists to be pro gun control.

[–] RamRabbit@lemmy.world 3 points 1 week ago (1 children)

Yep. Someone safely using their gun and teaching others how to safely use theirs can easily go through thousands of rounds in a pretty short time period. Someone murdering with one only needs a few rounds ever. Restricting ammo sale quantity only hurts safe and legal users.

[–] masterspace@lemmy.ca 1 points 1 week ago* (last edited 1 week ago) (1 children)

If it discourages people from owning guns or getting into guns as a hobby, then it makes society overal safer.

[–] RamRabbit@lemmy.world 1 points 1 week ago* (last edited 1 week ago) (2 children)

Abstinence only education doesn't work. Gun safety training is critical for safe use.

Being against gun safety is an extremely counterproductive position.

[–] ironhydroxide@sh.itjust.works 1 points 5 days ago

Critical for safe use, yes.

But really who is actually using them for any real purpose beyond: 1 hunting for sustinence (not sport) 2 military 3 protection from wildlife

How often do most gun owners actually do those things? How often do most people do those things?

Doesn't it make more sense that if you need to do those things, then you get the training before doing them?

[–] masterspace@lemmy.ca -1 points 1 week ago

Lmao, "Nothing can be done to prevent this, says only nation where this regularly happens".

Try and be less American.

[–] masterspace@lemmy.ca 1 points 1 week ago* (last edited 1 week ago)

I believe that was Chris Rock: https://youtu.be/VZrFVtmRXrw

[–] Dookieman12@piefed.social 1 points 1 week ago (1 children)

The real problem was always the grip being the serialized part of a firearm…

Not the grip, the receiver. Serializing the grip wouldn't make any sense. Sometimes the receiver includes the grip, sometimes it doesn't, it depends on the firearm.

Either way, it's basically the "frame" or "chassis" of the firearm. It doesn't make sense to serialize any other portion because you could just swap that part out and have an ostensibly different firearm.

[–] givesomefucks@lemmy.world 1 points 1 week ago

It doesn’t make sense to serialize any other portion because you could just swap that part out and have an ostensibly different firearm.

Grip/frame/chassis is the easiest part to make at home...

Yes, some part needs serialized no that does not mean we make it the easiest part to make yourself

[–] beep@piefed.world 17 points 1 week ago

California just passed a law

Looks inside

Mon 1 Jun 2026

[–] matlag@sh.itjust.works 14 points 1 week ago

Sounds so much like age limit to "protect the children". If that's seen as a good idea by the rest of the world's leaders... I hope my not-connected old printer will last as long as I!

[–] IAmYouButYouDontKnowYet@reddthat.com 10 points 1 week ago* (last edited 1 week ago)

Sick! They just made a stronger gun trafficking industry! This is a huge win for business minded career criminals. /S

[–] PattyMcB@lemmy.world 9 points 1 week ago

Their laws are so "liberal"

-sigh-

[–] FlashMobOfOne@lemmy.world 5 points 1 week ago (1 children)

My favorite thing about these super-specific gun laws is how we're 50 fiefdoms where none of it is ultimately enforceable.

Americans do not give a fuck. We're a violent people and if your kid gets hurt so we can have our toys, it's a-okay.

[–] Test_Tickles@lemmy.world 8 points 1 week ago (1 children)

Uvalde Texas re-elected the police chief who let all those children die in that school shooting.

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