About the RRRF
What is the RepRap Research Foundation?
The RepRap Research Foundation has a single purpose:
To promote research in self-replicating manufacturing systems
and to distribute the results of that research freely to everybody using
open-source licensing.
Membership of the RRRF
- The RRRF shall be a not-for-profit corporation.
- Membership of the RRRF shall be free.
- All members of the RRRF shall abide by all the rules of the RRRF.
- Membership of the RRRF shall be open to any person who does not break the RRRF’s rules.
- All members of the RRRF are encouraged to publish
all the results of their research on self-replicating manufacturing systems in
such a way as to make them freely available to everyone under an open-source
licence, for example at objects.reprap.org. - There shall be no corporate or organizational membership of the RRRF. However, as many people who are members of any corporation or organization and who wish may join as individual members of the RRRF.
- People who are minors in their country of residence must obtain permission from their parent or guardian to become members of the RRRF, and that parent or guardian must agree that the minor will abide by all the rules of the RRRF.
- Members of the RRRF shall be entitled to place the letters MRRRF after their name.
Hardware / Research Supplies
In order to research open-source software a person merely needs
to be able to copy information. But to research open-source manufacturing, even
self-replicating open-source manufacturing, that person must be supplied with
some initial hardware. To this end, the RRRF will distribute non-profit “starter
kits” at cost to any member requesting them so that those members may build the
hardware needed to do their research.
Members agree to use all hardware supplied to them by the RRRF
for research purposes only and not to use it for commercial gain. This
restriction is limited just to the supplied hardware; anything made or
derived from it is not subject to any restriction by the RRRF.
The Organizing Committee of the RRRF
The RRRF shall have an organizing committee consisting initially
of the six founder members listed below. All members of the organizing
committee shall automatically also be members of the RRRF.
Decisions on any rule-breaking by members of the RRRF shall be made by a
majority vote of the organizing committee.
Any member of the organizing committee may propose any addition
to or any change in or any repeal of the rules of the RRRF.
All rules of the RRRF shall be introduced changed or repealed by a majority vote of the organizing committee except the immediately
following one, for the change of which a majority of all the organizing
committee minus one is required.
Founder members of the organizing committee shall only be
removed from it by a unanimous vote of the organizing committee excepting
themselves, or by resignation.
New members of the organizing committee shall be approved by a majority vote of the existing organizing committee.
Any member of the organizing committee may resign at any time.
A member of the organizing committee who is not a founder member may
be required to leave the organizing committee as a result of a majority vote of
the organizing committee in which the member may participate.
All members of the organizing committee shall be required to take
part in all votes without abstention unless they are ill or otherwise
indisposed, or they are a founder member who is being proposed for removal.
In the event of a tied vote of the organizing committee a virtual
coin shall be tossed (at http://cgi.cs.duke.edu/~des/vct/vct.cgi) to decide the
issue. Heads shall be considered for the proposal, tails against.
Current Committee Members
Please see the Members page.
Guys,
I’ve been busy spreading the Gospels (i.e: tutoring Math’s & Physics)…
Curious about five things re’ RepRap:
1. Health & Safety
2. Sourcing materials & components
(I’ve been dealing w/ some Chinese companies recently)
3. Use of materials “like” PMC3 (Precious Metal Clay)
4. Use of Lasers
5. Use of Lisp as a language for RepRap
Of course, making one ‘ld be nice too… I’m sure I will though as I am sure that you will… what are your views on the issue s I’ve listed?
Regards,
Kevin
Health & Safety: we put warnings on pages where things might be a bit dodgy, and links to H&S data where appropriate. But the machine is a lot safer in general than - say - an electric drill.
Sourcing materials & components : that’s what the RRRF is about!
Use of materials “like” PMC3 (Precious Metal Clay): I am working on a design for a general paste extruder that should be up shortly.
Use of Lasers: solid state should be easy; gas less so…
Use of Lisp as a language for RepRap: if you want, by all means go ahead - this is an open-source project. We’ll be sticking to Java and C for the forseeable future though.
Best
Adrian
I do see one possible trick with the rules as listed above; it implies that we must keep two separate strains of RepRap technology, the ones which at some point had a piece of RRRF hardware involved in one of the machines, and the ones that are allowed to be used commercially. That does not even feel quite compatible with the LGPL that the project is licensed under; while I agree with the sentiment that the parts purchased here should not be turned straight into turning a profit, I would suggest that some wording change such that machines built with a machine using RRRF parts may be then used commercially. Perhaps specify that “using a machine with parts from the RRRF commercially” means “reselling the machine in whole or in part at a gain, or selling parts or other artifacts produced by that machine at a gain”, and that producing a new machine to be used in that manner through a machine with RRRF parts does not constitute using the RRRF hardware for commercial gain.
I am very keen on doing research, and will likely be getting everything I need through here; but it would be nice if I didn’t have to order a set of parts RPed up from a shop when I have a machine on my desk that can do it just to satisfy this requirement.
On a completely different note, I wholeheartedly support the use of Lisp as a language for development of what amounts to a hardware compiler; lisp is, after all, the language where you write the compiler from the problem description to executable code, and then run your problem and it works. It seems a very appropriate thing to use to write the software to run a matter compiler in. It seems to me that this could even lead to a sane machine description language, that could be used directly by people who work better in code than in GUI, and would make the GUIs have a more semantic way of doing things, which would help analysis greatly.
-Jonathan
Hi !
If LGPL is an issue, you guys might want to consider using the BSD license instead. Just my two cents.
Very nice project. Bravo !!