Episode: 3215
Title: HPR3215: Why I Gave Away a 3-D Printer
Source: https://hub.hackerpublicradio.org/ccdn.php?filename=/eps/hpr3215/hpr3215.mp3
Transcribed: 2025-10-24 18:58:26

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This is Hacker Public Radio Episode 3215 for Friday, 27 November 2020. Today's show is entitled
Why I Gave Away of 3D Printer. It is the 210th show of Ahuka,
and is about seven minutes long, and carries a clean flag. The summary is,
I briefly had a 3D printer and gave it away. This is why
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Hello, this is Ahuka for Hacker Public Radio.
Hello, this is Ahuka for Hacker Public Radio
and another exciting episode. I think we should have a whole new series
called Ken's Request, because if you've been around Hacker Public Radio
for any length of time, you could make the most innocent comment
and Ken's responsibly. I want to show on that. Well, this is one of those shows.
So I was watching the mailing list and Ken had posted that he was looking
for shows about 3D printers. It makes sense. And I innocently
enough wrote back and said, well, you know, I wish I could help, but I gave mine away.
Well, you can probably see where this is going. As soon as I said that, Ken said,
why on earth would someone give away a perfectly good 3D printer?
And of course, I want to show about it. Well, here we go.
This is a story that ties together two different pieces of my life,
both of which I have talked about a lot on Hacker Public Radio.
So this start, in October of 2017, I went to Ohio Linux Fest.
I've done that many times. I posted shows on Hacker Public Radio about it.
I spent a few years running publicity for them.
And it's a good convention for open source folks.
I'm looking forward to the virtual one this year.
Now, how did a guy from Michigan get involved in an Ohio event?
Well, for those who are not from the Midwest of the United States,
you might want to know that Michigan and Ohio are, we might call, friendly enemies.
There was a border war in the early 19th century, which Michigan won when Ohio was forced to take Toledo.
Now, that's a joke. Actually, we have a family membership at the Toledo Museum of Art.
And the University of Michigan and Ohio State University are football rivals
that close out their seasons each year with the rivalry matchup.
But the joining of this University of Michigan alumnus, which is me,
with the Ohio Linux Fest, came about because of Penguin Con,
the other event that I've been involved with,
which I have been going to for some time.
And I went to become the tech track programmer there for a few years
after I stepped down from my position at Ohio Linux Fest.
So these two things are kind of entwined together for me.
Now, it all started at Penguin Con,
because I had gone to a panel where George Castro,
who at the time worked for canonical, and, you know,
he has since left canonical to become community manager at VMware.
And he talked about how to get help with your Linux install.
A perfectly good talk for a tech conference.
It was good, but I noticed something missing.
He never mentioned Linux user groups.
Now, I was at the time, the leader of the Washington,
all Linux user group, Washington being the name of the county I live in.
And that's where the University of Michigan and other institutions are located.
And we helped people all the time at our monthly meetings.
And I was certain that there were lots of other groups out there doing the same thing.
So I spoke up and I asked George to correct the record,
which, of course, he graciously did.
But after that panel was over, I went out the hallway,
and I was approached by Beth Lynn Eiker,
who said they needed somewhat at Ohio Linux Fest
to be the liaison with the Linux user groups.
And based on my comment, she thought I would be a good candidate.
So I agreed to take that on.
And I was working under Joe Zonker Brockmeyer,
who was in charge of publicity.
The following years, Zonker stepped down.
He is now the editorial director at Red Hat.
And I took over his position as head of publicity,
largely because no one else wanted it.
Now, I did this for a few years.
Even after I stepped down, I continued to attend each year.
I think 2019 was the first year I missed since 2008,
which was my first year attending there.
I had retired.
My wife and I had a trip for our 40th wedding anniversary,
and there were other family matters.
My wife's mother died, and there were estate things too.
Yeah, well, there was just a lot of stuff going on.
So it was a busy time.
This year, the event is virtual for obvious reasons.
Still looking forward to it.
Got some good speakers.
But one of the ways Ohio Linux Fest raised some cash,
and it takes a lot of money to put on event like this,
was by having a raffle.
Corporate sponsors would donate items to be raffled off,
and attendees would buy raffle tickets.
So of course, I did what I usually do,
and bought something like $20 worth of tickets.
And when they got to the main prize,
my name was the one they called out.
So that is the story of how I obtained the printer,
but how did I come to give it away?
Now, that takes me back to Pangwakan.
Pangwakan chooses a charity each year
to receive both some focus and some money
that is raised through things like raffles.
And in 2016, this was an organization called ENABLE,
and there's a link in the show notes
if you want to find out more about them.
This is a group that uses 3D printers
to create prosthetic limbs for children
who are missing limbs through things like birth defects.
I thought this was a very good thing to be doing,
and I was proud that Pangwakan was promoting it.
So when my name was called at the OLF raffle,
I knew almost immediately what I would do.
My choices were either to have a neat toy I could play with,
or maybe make lives better for some children.
And that was no contest at all.
Now, the reason ENABLE was the charity
that you're at Pangwakan was because one of the organizers
was involved with the group and was, in fact, making limbs.
So when the printer was delivered to my home,
I messaged him to see if he could use it.
It turns out the one I got was a much better one
than what he had been using,
so he could do even more good work with it.
And it's not like I lack for toys in my life.
I know I did the right thing and I have never regretted it.
And with that, that is the story of how I gave away a 3D printer.
This is a hook-up for Hacker Public Radio signing off
and is always asking you to support free software.
Bye-bye.
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