There are several additive 3d printing technologies I'm aware of, as well as multiple subtractive technologies (including conventional CAD/CAM). I could conceive of a future where a factory is stocked with raw materials and then programmed to manufacture [whatever]. Appropriate monitoring and maintenance (either human or robotic) would still be needed, but it would make retooling an assembly line an almost obsolete process.

No, I'm pretty sure they've parallelized it. They probably printed one hundred fifty parts four hundred times.

"I think we should look at this from the military point of view. I mean, supposing the Russkies stashes away some big bomb, see. When they come out in a hundred years they could take over... In fact, they might even try an immediate sneak attack so they could take over our mineshaft space... I think it would be extremely naive of us, Mr. President, to imagine that these new developments are going to cause any change in Soviet expansionist policy. I mean, we must be... increasingly on the alert to prevent them from taking over other mineshaft space, in order to breed more prodigiously than we do, thus, knocking us out in superior numbers when we emerge! Mr. President, we must not allow... a mine shaft gap!"

- General Buck Turgidson

Uh, 3d printing is still cool. And news of a valid, economical 3d printed solution in commercial use is news for nerds.

3d printers may not be replicators, but they're as close as I'm getting in my lifetime, I suspect.

Apparently, a lot less than the cost of waiting for conventional technologies to fill the need. Trust me, GM isn't into giving away money.

Sneakernet and USB? You have received an e-card from a total stranger for no apparent reason? You got it from a toilet seat while surfing warez.com?

This may be an evasive piece of malware, but I'm pretty sure that this is a standard expectation from malware these days. As good as this software may be at obfuscating its presence I suspect tripwire will detect it readily enough (if the local SysAdmin has any security awareness whatsoever). Hooking into something like lib.c should ring alarm bells all over the place.

If deployment software such as Puppet or Chef are in use, file hashes won't match and shared libraries will be overwritten with (presumably known-good, clean, static) versions - probably very quickly, and once more, there will be a flashing neon sign blinking out "Problem here".

It'd be nice to know the propagation mechanism. If it were floating around in public code repositories, it would be a lot more widespread than it is, so I don't think I need to worry about apt-upgrade or yum update just yet. Most of the end-users I've ever dealt with think UNIX are for guarding harems. Inside job? Best way to hide exploits, have someone on the inside making sure they stay hidden.

Nonsense! We'll either pollute the environment beyond its ability to support us as a species, or irradiate the planet intentionally. If we're lucky, we might leave behind durable enough artifacts to confuse some sentient terrestrial archaeologist or paleontologist - but I doubt it.

. . . if we don't off ourselves before that.

That's a race I'm sure humanity will win.

Even the fastest AI will find it hard to extinguish humanity before we do it ourselves. Just sayin', is all.

If sequestering is good for carbon, why is it bad for say for spent nuclear fuel?

'Cuz carbon isn't toxic. When sequestration fails, carbon isn't likely to kill whoever finds it - it'll probably just smell really bad. Granted, there's no half-life, so it'll always smell funny; but it still isn't toxic for timespans measured in millennia.

That's why I only swim in 100% pure, clear, heavily chlorinated water - and never at a public pool (there's always a Baby Ruth bar floating around the pool there).

Well, of course. Since 2016, we 'Muricans ain't smart enough to do that junk any more. We're more into alternative science.

So . . . before /. jumped the shark?

Gotta backwalk one thing - I have a phone running Android, so I have a kind of de facto connectivity service always on in Google Duo. Fortunately, it's as popular as Google Circles!

Yes, but those aren't generally implemented in "always on" configurations. The most convenient conference room audio/video connectivity hardware on the market has to be "always on" so that it can be remotely controlled (by Managers with appropriate login passwords set to 1...2...3...4...5).

Even I don't run Skype/Zoom/[insert conferencing software solution here] in an "always on" configuration. A lot of these hardware solutions (including, presumably, Meat's offering) are designed for "always on" operation (i.e., connectivity as a service).

Damned spell-check. DIdn't catch me misspelling Facebook's new name. Oh well, I guess my error will be ensconced in post history from now on . . .