EDIT: My upload just got rejected. Apparently on top of a known printable object with pictures of it printed they wanted 3D renders of the objects. Funny, thingiverse has created their own 3D renders from day one. And there was nothing about this when I was uploading it the first time. Treasure Island needs content. If they're going to make it difficult to get that content then they're not going to have any.
EDIT 2: And now it's magically accepted. Gonna chalk this one up to growing pains... at a really inopportune time. Hopefully I helped them grow up. Unfortunately I don't think I'll be helping them grow.
Pirate3D, creator of the Buccaneer, a 3D printer that I would love to get my hands on one of, has created their own not-thingiverse called Treasure Island.
If you're a 3D printer manufacturer who is not makerbot I can understand the drive to make a repository of things that is not associated with Makerbot. The problem is you're competing with the oldest and bigest repository of 3D things to date. You will forever be behind. If you don't come up with something to make yourself stand apart, and have a ton of luck, it's a death of obscurity for you.
That said the Pirate3D folks are jumping in with both feet. Slick interface, easy navigation, easy upload, "curated" library so you know you're only downloading things for your 3D printer, and a bookmark tool for saving the cool things you find for later. There's still a few rough edges, like the fact that they only accept pictures that are bigger than 1158x560 and the only pictures I have of my lovecraft pawns are 1024x768. Still, they nailed it on ease of uploading, attribution, and editing. And despite their claims of curation my first upload was approved way before they could have actually printed it to verify that it would work. They're clearly using something to programatically verify prints which puts them ahead of where myminifactory started.
Now all they need is for people to upload some cool things.
Treasure Island is still young and it has a lot of room to grow, so I'll withhold judgement for a little while. But I will say, as a content creator, that they need something to incentivize model producers like myself to use their service. Personally, I'm still looking for a good place I can offer paid models. Either that or if Pirate3D would be willing to send me a Buccaneer I'd negotiate exclusive first show rights to anything I produce for some length of time. Call me.
You said you wanted a good place to sell models - have you tried selling them on CGTrader?
ReplyDeleteI was for a while a huge supported of CGTrader. I had them on my sidebar and I had a lot of things listed with them, some free, some paid. I had high hopes for them.
DeleteAnd then I sold something. And I sold it through bitcoin. And I discovered why CGTrader is *not* good for selling 3D models through. Because as soon as I sold something, one thing, all my things were on lockdown, I couldn't edit them and who knows what was happening on the customer side, until I paid a $2 restocking fee on a $3 sale. A 66% sales fee that came due after the sale that locked everything up until I paid it to them. And could I just give them some of the bitcoin they collected from my sale? Nope.
Etsy takes a $0.20 fee when you list an item. MakeXYZ tacks 15% on whatever I invoice people and they don't bother me about collecting it. But CGTraider back loads their fees and makes you very conscious about paying it. There are better ways of doing business and until CGTraider learns that I will be sticking with Ponoko.
I'm not going to blast CGTraider on the front page with a post. They can correct it, and I hope they do. But I've told them all this and their only response was to change their restocking fee on small sales to $1. They clearly are shooting for a different market than one already spoiled by thingiverse.
Literally as I was typing this response CGTraider sent me an e-mail with this announcement.
Deletehttp://www.cgtrader.com/blog/cgtrader-com-redesigned-the-new-reality-is-here
So now they're offering a streaming service so content creators can control how their user's print their objects. That's a big fat NOPE for me for so many reasons. So now maybe I will blast CGTraider on the front page. I don't know. I'm so mad right now.
Yeah, same thing happened to me after I sold a model, and I didn't pay the fee or relist my items. In fact I had to spend more to buy credits than the item sold was worth...boo!
DeleteThe thing they have going for them is a huge existing customer base. With all the attention they're giving the 3D printing side of their site, I'm thinking it's gonna be a big player in the game.
I was very interested by your comments "But I will say, as a content creator, that they need something to incentivize model producers like myself to use their service. Personally, I'm still looking for a good place I can offer paid models."
ReplyDeleteOn my blog (super new and only one article), I'm actually calling for a new type of marketplace that would answer your need. http://3dmaker.io/post/82195274991/3d-printing-marketplaces