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Related: Editorials & Other Articles, Issue Forums, Alliance Forums, Region ForumsAre Blueprints For 3D-Printed Guns Protected Speech?
http://www.forbes.com/sites/frankminiter/2015/05/12/are-blueprints-for-3d-printed-guns-protected-speech/It was about two years ago (on May 5, 2013 to be precise) when the worlds first 3D-printed, plastic gun was test fired. It wasnt quite a shot heard round the world, but it was a shot that echoed around many media outlets. At the time, many noted that 3D-printing technology could put government regulators at a disadvantage, but the media mostly concentrated on the fear that undetectable plastic guns might be printed off in secret by criminals or even terrorists.
Cody Wilson, a then law student in Texas and a self-proclaimed libertarian, designed the the Liberator. Wilson also made the blueprints for the gun available for anyone to download on the Internet for free. The plans went viral, though it is hard to say how many of the 100,000-plus people who downloaded the blueprints actually have access to a 3D printer.
Are you free to tell someone how to make a weapon? How about drawing blueprints? How about uploading those blueprints to the web where it will be impossible to remove anyways?
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Are Blueprints For 3D-Printed Guns Protected Speech? (Original Post)
TampaAnimusVortex
May 2015
OP
Is that the one with the recipe for those delightful little lemon squares to serve at rallies?
Nuclear Unicorn
May 2015
#6
Nuclear Unicorn
(19,497 posts)1. Have you tried a web search for weapons blueprints?
They're out there and not just for 3D printers, either. They've been around forever; from drawings to CAD renderings. That djinni is looooong out of the bottle.
Go Vols
(5,902 posts)2. Yep
this has been around since '71.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Anarchist_Cookbook
Nuclear Unicorn
(19,497 posts)6. Is that the one with the recipe for those delightful little lemon squares to serve at rallies?
I love those!
Codeine
(25,586 posts)3. Of course they are.
How on earth could it be anything but?
Runningdawg
(4,509 posts)4. I don't know the official answer
but I am going with yes, you can tell someone how to make a weapon. Back in the late 70's there was a kid who wrote a paper on how to make a nuclear weapon. There was a huge flap at the time and I think it was determined, not sure by whom, possibly congress, that he had the right to print the instructions.
Agschmid
(28,749 posts)5. Yes.
What an interesting century...