meanwhile...
https://twitter.com/Joe_Mayes/status/1232253794597163008?s=19
The more I see of Cummings, the more I think he must have read too much science fiction at an impressionable age.
His behaviour is rather typical of one strand of the neo-reactionaries: anti-democracy, libertarian, deluded about technology shading towards transhumanism st cetera.
Basically overgrown manchildren with a crippling lack of self-awareness.
Yup. The transhumanism is one that I recognise from the sort of books I was thinking of, but hadn't made the explicit connection myself.
Not without vast numbers of fabrication units, with the commensurate investment of capital, skilled labour and space.
Even then. At the moment, I believe there are a few universtiy-level demos of inkjet printing of organic transistors and maybe even very small scale integrated circuits. Nothing like the 7nm-gate process that is state of the art for silicon integrated circuits. So you still need to import any silicon* chips for any intelligence of any 3D-printed product. I'm assuming that if you are talking about high tech manufacturing, you are probably going to want to have some type of intelligence in the product somewhere.
Not only that, but again, unless you want it to be completely passive, you are probably going to want to put motors and you will also want to interface with some power supply, and maybe have sufficient outputs to control those motors.
All these will need components that can't be 3D printed in the medium-term if ever. So you still have the same problem that you rely on lots of incoming components.
Even if you are making something that can be entirely 3D printed with equipment that's commercially available today, you still need the start materials, which, if you are going to sell to any large customer, will need paperwork to check compliance with standards. Also, if you managed to make it profitable, you'd be vulnerable to copycat 3D printers. Especially if you were selling outside the UK and there's not an agreement to protect IP.
Apart from that, I also guess that there's the problem that if you are selling to someone outside the UK, then *they* still want a stable supply, so unpredictable customs delays would put you at a huge competitive disadvantage compared to competitors in trading blocs with functioning customs agreements.
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Saying this, I can easily see how someone who is far too in love with their own self-perceived ability and with the idea of a small band of technological "wizards" creating an anarcho-capitalist future would go for th epossibility of 3D printing.
I can also see how a proponent of such ideas might impress someone like Johnson.
And this is one of the stories I was thinking of - quite unpleasant characters.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Oath_of_Fealty_(novel)
Post-Brexit cheerleading from the BBC regarding the impact of the UK/US trade deal. The headline:
https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-politics-51706802
From the story:
The BBC is quoting the most optimistic figure as if it was guaranteed.
What makes very interesting reading is:
I suppose those out of work investment bankers will be picking cabbages in Lincolnshire
Yup - I noticed that too
*unless you have
really specialised requirements, where other materials might be better.
