I would expect that the solution to GF going away would be a swap on the controller to something like the Smoothie board. If there are steppers in the GF, a different controller could do that so I wouldn’t worry about that issue. The unknown things would be the variable power supply and the cameras. I think there’s some work in the Smoothie camp to control power supplies so I’d expect that would be able to be handled.
It would require someone to either replace a board or add one for the GF. Folks have created drop-in replacements for the chineses lasers (like the guys at Cohesion) so it’s not as simple as pointing to a new cloud address but it would allow GF owners to have something other than a paperweight and not require a lot of technical expertise.
I agree that producing code that for standard laser cutting would be faster to generate than the extra cutting and engraving features promised for our GFs, especially the Pro models. Hopefully it never comes to that and in a few months time this be a forgotten concern.
Most users don’t want to be forced into monthly fees just to access data files that they already have produced. In GFs case, at some point down the road you may see a fee imposed for your continued use of the GF cloud services. GF has committed to making that a free service for current users, but that commitment can change for a variety of reasons, say a change of ownership.
It’s also not clear to me if all of the GF cloud features, currently promised and those developed new in future, are included with the purchase of a GF Basic or Pro. It would seem fair to have to pay for new cloud features in some manner and it would be interesting to see how GF plans to deal with that eventuality.
Possibly. Thing is, they can’t charge to use the device you spent thousands on. Imagine if you bought a car, you own the thing, and it wouldn’t start unless you paid your bill. (I’m not talking about supplying it fuel.)
That’s not to say anything about new features. But, still… That’d be one lame company that did that to its customers.
Agreed and it’s happened to me before. I’d just as soon not make the same mistake twice. As I may have suggested elsewhere, maybe @dan could comment on cloud pricing policy, now and in future, in the next update.
We don’t charge for any features right now, and we don’t have any future pricing announcements to share beyond what I’ve said before about existing features not being charged for.
Glowforge goes under, cloud services lost, no firmware of any sort exists anywhere for us to use. Heck, all of the programming team even disappears from the face of the world so we cannot even hope one happens to have a random old backup to sneakily distribute.
You still have motors, belts, mirrors, a power supply and a tube. All of these are very well known entities, and they have inputs and outputs that behave in known manners.
Laserweb or any other programming inclined group would easily slip in a smoothieboard or a beaglebone and have the whole system up and running (sans camera) within a month of dedicated work.
Camera is down, so homing is lost. That would mean grabbing a drill and buying a few limit switches.
So, a grand total of $40 gets you back up to a functioning laser cutter. You can now ditch the case and buy new rails/belts to increase your bed size as well (ideally design and produce a new case before you ditch the old one. Acrylic is a nasty stink)
Dan has been very clear in other posts that the cloud based software will not be open sourced, unlike the firmware which has been been promised to be open sourced when the units start shipping.
I do hope that, in the unfortunate event of company collapse, that position will be reconsidered. I realize the code, or portions thereof, could be recycled and used in any number of applications going forward, but still.
If the company collapsed I still think it is unlikely to be open sourced by GF as it would lose its value - instead the software/IP would just be sold to the highest bidder along with the other assets of the company e.g. customer base, online stores, Proofgrade, trademarks, etc.
What a new owner might do with software/IP/assets is just pure speculation…
IMHO I think this scenario is very unlikely given GF appear to have considered a number of future revenue streams (e.g. Proofgrade, Design Store), product extensions (replaceable head) and I am sure new GF versions (bigger, faster, new features).
Ooooorrrrrrrrrrr…
This is all a topic that doesn’t really need to continue, because the strength of GF is self evident and the money to keep things going is still all there and nothing to worry about.
Seems like an over simplistic view. Without things like limit switches like other devices, there are quite a few limitations. It also assumes someone else will solve the problems of the interface.
Of course it is. When one purchases something the expectation is that it will work, and work for as long as reasonably possible. That’s not a complicated concept at all. But if you disagree, so be it.
