this post was submitted on 14 Jun 2025
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3DPrinting

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177
Etsy cracks down on 3D printed products — new rules exclude many 3D printed items from listings (www.tomshardware.com)
submitted 2 days ago by cm0002@lemmy.world to c/3dprinting@lemmy.world
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[–] suswrkr@discuss.tchncs.de 6 points 6 hours ago* (last edited 6 hours ago)

etsy is doing the right thing here. why should you be able to sell stuff you didn't design there?

the world already has too many plastic articulated dragons. this sort of waste tarnishes reputation of 3d printing as a less wasteful way to create functional parts without shipping, or as an art form.

[–] Jhex@lemmy.world 5 points 7 hours ago (1 children)

Etsy is not worth the risk... full of drop shippers and scammers

[–] B0rax@feddit.org 4 points 6 hours ago

There is definitely still good stuff there. But you need to use common sense for sure

[–] dual_sport_dork@lemmy.world 132 points 2 days ago (3 children)

Awesome. I fully approve of this. If you want to sell 3D printed stuff, sell it on an appropriate platform and for fuck's sake, sell things that you actually have the rights to print and sell.

Next, let's crack down on the hordes of losers on Etsy who just drop-ship crap from Alibaba for a 6000% markup while boldfadedly claiming it's "hand made" in the hopes that everyone is too stupid to notice. (But people must be, because apparently that's still working.)

[–] tischbier@feddit.org 61 points 2 days ago (2 children)

They’re still allowing 3D printed items if the person selling is the origin of the model. At least that’s what I gathered from the article.

[–] CmdrShepard49@sh.itjust.works 24 points 2 days ago (1 children)

How do you prove you're the creator of a model without directly handing your IP over to this company?

[–] monkeyman512@lemmy.world 21 points 1 day ago (1 children)

I assume that is about hitting duplicate items. If there are 100 people selling the EXACT same dragon, hit them all and sort out the details later.

[–] CmdrShepard49@sh.itjust.works 11 points 1 day ago (2 children)

That doesn't really answer the question and also introduces issues with situations like Bambu's Creator's Program (or whatever it's called) where you can pay the model creator for the rights to sell the item. I don't see why they need to target 3D prints specifically when Etsy is absolutely chock full of similar duplicates in other mediums. They're just going to drive people away to a new site, which is fine I suppose, but seems incredibly short sighted.

[–] planish@sh.itjust.works 3 points 7 hours ago (1 children)

Etsy IIRC is not meant to be a general marketplace: it's meant to be for handmade or flea-market vintage type stuff.

They then have to turn that into hard rules, and one of them is you can't just manufacture stuff and turn around and sell it: manufactured stuff has to be old enough, and I think they have a particular year.

3D printing is a lot like manufacturing, and a little like making by hand. The more people use it like manufacturing, the less Etsy will want to have it.

[–] CmdrShepard49@sh.itjust.works 1 points 5 hours ago* (last edited 2 hours ago)

I'd argue it's closer to hand made than manufacturing due to most people only having the ability to crank out small batches of prints as a side hustle. I still think it's short sighted and wonder why other CNC devices aren't also being banned like CNC routers, laser cutters, laser engravers, pen plotters, etc since these all use similar designs and mechanical systems. Where do you draw the line? I can understand only wanting hand made or vintage items but if technology is advancing past that and the market isn't really there for those items, then what's the purpose of the site? What are they going to tell both buyers and sellers that they're not the type of clientele they want on their platform? That seems nuts as a business.

[–] tischbier@feddit.org 3 points 1 day ago

Yeah, I agree with your take. I can see why people are annoyed with the eggs and dragons cluttering the shops.

But that being said— Most of the models I’ve seen are ones you can pay the creator for a license to print and sell it for a profit. It’s pretty easy to find that kind of deal and the contract is explicit in their listing. So, the original designers will be losing business too since they bank off of making cute model files and collect passive income from people who want to print and sell the item.

Considering how much crap is on Etsy, maybe I’m missing something, but I am not sure why the crack down now—and on 3D prints of all things.

I actually think 3D printers at home will end up replacing a lot of things that used to be shipped from China. I’m already seeing the edges of this but time will tell if that trend keeps going that way. But I 3D print so, I notice functional things I can make all the time.

I think you make a good point—I wonder what site they’ll jump to?

[–] Sixtyforce@sh.itjust.works 12 points 2 days ago

That's sensible.

[–] corsicanguppy@lemmy.ca 14 points 1 day ago* (last edited 1 day ago) (1 children)

If you want to sell 3D printed stuff, sell it on an appropriate platform and for fuck's sake, sell things that you actually have the rights to print and sell.

I'm so relieved that there's an appropriate platform!

I need some brackets to mount a gadget I ebayed as a spare. The vendor included tapped holes for mounting, but never sold the brackets. About 3 designs out there offer a solid and reliable mounting solution.

Each one a bit that would fit in a 1990 drugstore film cylinder, only 40c to print and us$71 shipping to the V3L, it seems.

There is no library in my area still maintaining a running 3d printer. I have no contacts nerdier than me who have a working printer.

Where is this place that I can get my brackets? I can't justify a $250 printer just for 4 bracket pieces!

[–] dual_sport_dork@lemmy.world 13 points 1 day ago

There are oodles of commercial 3D printing services that will run off whatever you send them for a price. Craftcloud, Shapeways, Xometry, etc.

Or printathing.com, if you'd like to get hooked up with a private(ish) person to do it for you.

Or just ask at any of the innumerable online spaces where people talk about 3D printing (like right here) and someone can probably do it for you, too.

My exception is not to people printing things for others for a specific purpose if asked to. It's against stealing other people's work and cynically trying to turn it around for a profit, without putting any effort into it and probably implicitly passing it off as if it were your own work in the process. Likewise, I don't object to someone designing their own thing and selling their own thing on Etsy. But just to put it into perspective I imagine most people would also rank it as Not Cool to go on Etsy and start trying to sell, say, just printouts random stuff you downloaded from DeviantArt.

[–] chicken@lemmy.dbzer0.com 7 points 1 day ago* (last edited 1 day ago) (1 children)

sell things that you actually have the rights to print and sell.

This would exclude the thousands of makers who subscribe to designers like Cinderwing3D, and have permission to print and sell her articulated dragon designs.

It sounds like they do have the rights, and this policy is still causing problems for them because there's a difference between having the rights and being the original creator.

[–] dual_sport_dork@lemmy.world 5 points 1 day ago (1 children)

Yes, that part specifically is a bit braindead.

It's probably because they can't be arsed to figure out who has the rights and who doesn't, so they just loaded up the ban shotgun.

[–] Feathercrown@lemmy.world 2 points 7 hours ago

I think it's intentional

[–] the16bitgamer@programming.dev 31 points 1 day ago (1 children)

As someone who sell their 3D Prints on Etsy. This is fantastic. We had other shops try to sell older versions of my designs and even trying to use my photos in their listing. If this stops that I am all for it.

[–] tischbier@feddit.org 8 points 1 day ago

That is a great perspective. If it could prevent hijacking and original design ownership exclusivity that would be excellent. Good luck!

[–] doc@fedia.io 6 points 2 days ago (5 children)

Well shit. I needed discontinued clips for my PC case and 3D printed listings of a public model were my only source. There is some utility in reselling the stuff. Where else can I go now?

[–] Taleya@aussie.zone 3 points 8 hours ago

Where you located? Most 3d printer owners are happy to help

[–] monkeyman512@lemmy.world 14 points 1 day ago (1 children)

I think there are 3D printing services that make to order.

[–] JustEnoughDucks@feddit.nl 13 points 1 day ago (1 children)

For the low low price of 50€ for a 30g part!

[–] peregrin5@lemm.ee 1 points 4 hours ago

Buy a 3D printer. Might as well have one.

[–] partial_accumen@lemmy.world 11 points 1 day ago

Public libraries in my city have 3D printers even with staff to run them. You can either pay for how much filament your print takes from them (at their cost with no markup) or even bring your own filament.

[–] dual_sport_dork@lemmy.world 9 points 1 day ago (1 children)

Send me the file or a link and I'll print it for you. I'm sure plenty of other nerds would do the same.

There are also commercial print services, but local nerds are always a great first resort.

[–] Bronzie@sh.itjust.works 4 points 13 hours ago

Yeah.

If it's just a few clips and <50g of filament, I wouldn't even charge for it to help someone out.
Pay postage and we're good.

[–] AnotherMadHatter@lemmy.world 4 points 1 day ago* (last edited 1 day ago) (1 children)

There were / are a couple of subreddits, 3dprintmything and another I forgot. Maybe there is a similar community on Lemmy?

[–] dual_sport_dork@lemmy.world 9 points 1 day ago (2 children)

Not that I can find.

I was about to say something monumentally stupid, along the lines of, "somebody ought to make it."

The hell with it. I just made it.

!printmything@lemmy.world

[–] deepfriedchril@lemmy.world 5 points 1 day ago (1 children)

I have no idea how this worked on reddit, but maybe require a certain format for requests? Location and process for starters.

[–] dual_sport_dork@lemmy.world 3 points 1 day ago

That may be a good idea.

I'm sure we'll figure out what so the other good ideas are as we go along...

[–] IMALlama@lemmy.world 4 points 1 day ago

And I'll be the first vendor!

[–] nesc@lemmy.cafe 5 points 2 days ago

Good.