Robohand: how cheap 3D printers built a replacement hand for a five-year old boy

THIS IS HOW YOU DO IT

this is the coolest thing i have seen in open source open platform tech that helps people in their every day lives,
every body considers the "INVENTOR" in the patent discussion,
ie

you have to pay inventors or they simply wound not invent.
well this article shoots holes in the greed to design theory.

WHAT ABOUT THE BENEFIT TO SOCIETY?
you know the original idea behind patents (the social benefit has lost ground to just profit)
things are changing

people helping their childeren or others childeren is about as good a reason to invent (if not better) than any other

Creators make the design public domain to help people who can't afford prostheses.

TECHNOLOGY LAB / INFORMATION TECHNOLOGY
Robohand: how cheap 3D printers built a replacement hand for a five-year old boy
Creators make the design public domain to help people who can't afford prostheses.

by Sean Gallagher - Feb 2 2013, 10:15am NZDT
INFORMATION TECHNOLOGY OPEN SOURCE
21

Liam's Robohand, the product of a collaboration between Ivan Owen in Bellingham, Washington and Richard Van As in South Africa—and produced on a MakerBot 3D printer.
Not too long ago, Liam had no fingers on his right hand. The South African 5-year old was born with Amniotic Band Syndrome, which causes amputation of digits before birth. But since November, Liam has been using a series of prosthetic hands designed by two men living on opposite sides of the planet, using open source software and 3D-printing technology.

Now, those two men—Ivan Owen in Bellingham, Washington and Richard Van As in South Africa—have published the design for Robohand, the mechanical hand prosthesis, on MakerBot's Thingiverse site as a digital file that can be used to produce its parts in a 3D printer. They've intentionally made the design public domain, in the hopes that others around the world who don't have access to expensive commercial prosthetics (which can cost tens of thousands of dollars) can benefit from it.


Liam, on his third day with his completed Robohand.
The project began with a mechanical hand Owen made for a science fiction convention in 2011. He works for a school supply business during the day, but also works from home creating special effects. When a video of Owen demonstrating the oversized hand went viral, it got the attention of Van As, who had lost most of four fingers on his right hand in a woodworking accident. Van As had been told that prosthetic fingers, such as the X-Finger, would cost him at least $10,000 per finger replaced, so he set about in his workshop trying to design his own.

arstechnica.com...

this BLOWS HOLES in the argument that inventors must have exclusive rights for their products as an incentive to design innovate or create.

by giving this design away others will be able to use and further innovate and even more childeren will be able to afford to have the benefit of the innovation.

with the relitivly new tech of 3d printing the process was further speed up



the way of the future

Owen also hopes to get his hand into the hands of the Defense Department and Department of Veterans Affairs to help veterans who have lost digits or hands. "I live not too far from Seattle, and [we] have Joint Base Lewis McChord near us," he said. "I would like to talk to on-base occupational therapists. If they have the funding to get a 3D printer, they could work with this—and the cost to produce them for each veteran is brought down because they don't have to pay royalties."

i am smiling as i write this,
the open source future is coming and very soon people will design to help not just for profit



xploder

Star and a flag for sure . This is the coolest thing I have seen in a long time . And with Open Source done on three D printers ?

You are stone cold right right , being able to manufacture advanced products like this pretty much at home with no patent worries has staggering implications for the future . We need to keep a close eye on three D printing .

This is a wonderful use of new technology and is an inspirational example of what people can do for each other. Good job guys , the look on that kids face was priceless. I almost cried, and I don't do that!

S&F

I'll be honest, I don't enjoy many threads here anymore, but this one was great on all fronts and for all the right reasons.

On another note, we missed the boat with cassettes, cd/dvds, and digital media. That said I think early investment in 3d printing is gonna be MASSIVE, it WILL change EVERYTHING and nobody on Earth will be able to stop it. It is potentially the great equalizer we've all been waiting for.

The cool part about 3d printing is that the software to design the models have been widely available for years. there are already libraries of models ready to be printed, I have a small library myself.

As that kid grows older, and grows out of the prosthetic, he could design a unique prosthetic hand himself that fits.

I can't wait to get my hands on one, just out of my price range at the moment.


Posted Via ATS Mobile: m.abovetopsecret.com

reply to post by XPLodER


"the open source future is coming and very soon people will design to help not just for profit"


it is a nice thought, but they will just make laws that you cant give it out or they will turn around and make a law stating you can steal whatever design off internet or open source and who ever makes patent on it owns it.


just like handing out free food or lemonade to people on the street, they will arrest you, fine you, or make the area where you can give free food 20 mi outt from town.

What 'god' breaks, science fixes.

Thanks for posting something cool and positive! Too much "doom porn" on ATS these days, it's nice to see something like this.

reply to post by ~widowmaker~


Since when can you not hand out free food on the street? I mean, if the person is willing to give it out, how can the person be arrested?

It's great that the kid can once again hold things and play with his friends.

If we have more people that are willing to do things not just for money, the world might become a better and more technological place, kind of like in Star Trek.

reply to post by XPLodER


you are wrong.life is all about making money.nobody respects a goody two shoes and most people hate them.

by giving it free you are basically saying it is worthless and nobody likes free things and will think you are a loser.

for example if i give you a a free sofa you will think i am stupid and treat the sofa like dirt.because it is free.

but if i make you pay $500 for it you will respect me and not abuse the sofa.

basically people don't appreciate free things and will hate you because they feel obligated to you.

reply to post by extraterrestrialentity


well i dont want to derail the topic but its true, most states will fine, you, ask you to leave, or send to jail if no comply/no permit. their reason is we have enough shelters and we dont want to attract more to the area. just this year er last year there was a group trying to hand out food at a public event and they were a real charity group, they were asked to pack up and leave the premiss even though it was public property heh, they had to move 3 blocks away from event or face being arrested. an older woman was feeding kids in her neighbor hood and a neighbor complained and they were going to fine her for not being an etery and handing food out with no health codes ect ect, the kids were poor and always hungry...

nice country we are turning into heh?

now if you were to just give it to a friend or a left over sandwich im pretty sure you can get away with that.


anyway back ontopic ^^ could these be used to make a real weapon and ammo cases?