ABSTRACT
A 1935 newsreel from British Pathé foresaw a future when the city composed of 'a vast agglomeration of tall buildings and slums' is radically transformed. It would be architecturally planned to a new order and less prone to 'pure and rugged individualism'. This chapter examines the '3D printing system' that is coming into being around the world. It assesses the ease with which rapid prototyping slotted into the triad of interlocking systems providing the lion's share of the world's objects. With the arrival of information and communication technologies in the current production–distribution–consumption triad came new possibilities for industries to experiment with manufacturing processes from a computer and digital fabrication technology rather than in a factory. The chapter establishes what 3D printing is and summarizes the things this innovation can and cannot do by looking more closely at its history. The manufacture of pins has been a lodestone for thinkers on progress in industrial production for centuries ever since inspiring the prominent economist Adam Smith.
