My predictions on who will be active a year from now

#1

No, no lists, just some observations about what I have observed about myself and others.

This is my third Digi-fab machine and I think it breaks down like this:

  • I ordered it for X and it does X well. These people will keep and use their :glowforge: but won’t be very active here.

  • I ordered it for X and it does not do X well. Hard stop. These people will either sell or their unit will mostly sit.

  • I ordered it for X and it does not do X well BUT it does Y and Z very nicely, why didn’t I see this earlier? These people will be very active after they get over X.

  • I ordered it for X and it does X well but I had never thought of Y and Z. oh, wow. These will be the most active of all.

These are kind of broad generaiztions but I think most people fit somewhat into one of these.

#2

Bought it for… Uh, to be honest, I have no idea what I bought it for. So I guess I’m in the camp where X doesn’t matter, but I hope it does Y and Z very nicely because that’ll be fun.

#3

Yeah, for now, I’d put you in the fourth group. Only time tells.

#4

I have been active for over two years, but just got my stalker, er, um “enthusiast” badge for 365 consecutive days of checking in on the forum. Now that I have that done, I can stop. Yeah, right. I have tons more to do with this Glowforge and the forum folks are adding the most value at the fastest rate to the machine. I don’t see that metric slowing down. Glowforge will keep trickling out the improvements, more people will keep getting the lasers, veterans will keep improving their stuff and posting it, and the project will just keep getting better.

I have seen no indications that forum participation is detracting from my user experience, so I’ll stick around. Haven’t seen too many people in the second group in terms of percentage of added value posts to time suck, garbage tech posts. Cancellations, sure.

Perhaps we can term the first group as Don’t bother me, I’ll be in my bunk reading up on the Glowforge manual! :wink:. I can envision the majority of owners doing this, but with some opting for a different social medium regarding sharing their work, something that has been demonstrated in the Facebook group.

#5

I have observed that internet communities evolve over time, as the blossom fades. I belonged to one, ‘BYOPVR’ when I became interested in putting together a home theater. It was a great group also, but as time and technology progressed the ‘Regulars’ eventually drifted away as their interests evolved. There have been a couple of others too - but none quite as tight as this one.

#6

The advantage here is that the creativity doesn’t have boundaries so there’s always something popping up that inspires an “ah ha cool” moment. Keeps things fresh & new.

#7

This is so true, people are coming up with use cases I would have never thought of.

#8

Yep, the range of things that can be done are quite mind boggling. From small to large, functional to artful…and the sxope of folks we have from such a variety of backgrounds is just amazing.

#9

I know my forum has slowed down, at least in the case I can’t keep my unread (or even new for that matter) down to zero any more, but I can’t stay away because of the great ideas I find, and the quality of so many of the people. I know the group will change over time, and eventually it may no longer be a priority, but for me that doesn’t seem to be coming any time soon.

One thing I love about this machine is how fast you can prototype. Has a special program at church tonight, needed some scrabble tiles as well as some numbered chips to help divide people into groups. I won’t say they were pretty. I kept them simple, using scores more than engrave to keep the speed up. But in the end they looked way cooler than a piece of paper I copied and cut into pieces :wink: People kept asking, “where did you buy these?” It was fun to say, “O, I just made them real quick this afternoon :smile:”

#10

You & me both! I got off to a slow start with it because life got on the way at first, but now that I’m having time to play with it lately AND found Affiniry Designer, I’m LOVE LOVE LOVING this thing!

I’ve been less active lately since the vibe has swung negative. I get it, but I’d rather spend my spare time vaporizing things with a laser. :smile:

#11

It does exactly what I bought it for, plus a lot of Y and Z that I don’t use much now, but might decide i want to try to get better at one day. (I feel like from a value per decision standpoint I’m gonna be patting myself on the back for a loooooong time for this one. And everyone loves to snag a deal - this was one of my better ones.) :smile:

But if I hang around, it will be for the people. So much to learn from this group. So many creative ideas. Many still to see…yep, gonna hang around as long as I can. :slightly_smiling_face:

Definitely want to see what comes next.

#12

Aint that the truth! Even as one of my more expensive buys its value is tremendous. Kind of makes up for a few of my white elephant tool buys.

#13

My perspective is different. I have had a laser before. I know what the competitor can do and bought into the promo sales hype that this one could do more. So far this one can’t do the X I bought it for. Still hanging in there hoping…

#14

What’s exciting (and frustrating) is when you try something new, you get all whipped up about it, knock something out quicker than you thought you could…and then realize you have to buy some little specialized hardware to finish it off. Man, waiting on stuff from China is a true drag. :face_with_raised_eyebrow:

#15

Didn’t you do those adorable little miniatures? You should be able to do a lot of the cutwork for those without any trouble…this thing is incredibly precise. :slightly_smiling_face:

#16

So part of the missing software?

#17

By the looks of things, cuts are way off from where they appear on the screen. Precision is EVERYTHING in miniatures. (1/4" off is considered “ok” by GF but that would be 3’ in my world)

#18

I’m not sure what you mean by that… but I’m assuming you mean am I waiting for software improvements? If so, yes, that is what I’m hoping for.

#19

I don’t want to play cheerleader or banshie on this.
On the one hand, most people are getting way-way better than 1/4" placement with properly miked out material and it only looks to get better.
On the other hand, anything less than perfect is unacceptable if not fixed. Especially for some use cases.

#20

I know everyone says they’re working on it, but that’s because they actually are. The one I’m testing started out off by 1/4", it’s now dead accurate. But it’s a PRU that they have a lot of metrics on. Soon they’re going to include that with the new units going out, and roll it back to the currently released units, and the placement problems are going to go away.

In the meantime, there are a couple of simple work-arounds that make it easy to get very accurate results.

Did you happen to see the grains of rice I engraved? This was months ago, with a non-fully tuned PRU unit. The unit has actually gotten more accurate with placement since then.

I guess what I’m trying to say is…patience is going to help. Things are moving along.

(I know it’s tough after a two year wait - I don’t have mine yet either, and if i were to get one right now, I’d probably have to wait a little longer for the alignment I’m getting on this one.) There’s just no way for them to hurry it up any more. Not if folks want quality.