Carolyn Fath
The Ultimaker 2, a 3D printer, has been a popular attraction in the lobby of the Middleton public library.
On a recent evening, in the lobby of Middleton’s public library, a handful of inquisitive patrons stopped to watch the Ultimaker 2 as it printed a small model glider.
This particular printer, however, doesn’t reproduce information by squirting ink onto paper. Rather, its nozzle slowly extrudes 410-degree melted plastic onto a heated surface.
The end result is neither a picture nor prose, but a three-dimensional object, printed one horizontal, 40-micron-thick layer atop another. The machine, on permanent display, has captivated people since it arrived last spring, says executive director Pamela Westby.
“It’s a great way to collaborate with the community in a creative way,” she says. “We’re committed to expanding access to 21st-century tools and technology.”
Over the last several years, public libraries around the world have embraced 3D printing technology as way to reassert their relevancy in the Information Age.
“[Public libraries] used to have the market cornered on being the place you go to get information on the rest of the world,” says Benjamin Miller, former director of the Sauk City Public Library. “The Internet has changed that.”
Just watch a Mold-a-Rama create souvenir animals in plastic-injection molds at the Henry Vilas Zoo, and you can see how 3D printers have an undeniable allure.
But not everyone is enthralled with the idea of public libraries providing 3D printing as a core service. In fact, the printers have hit a nerve among those whose see libraries changing from places of inquiry to places of creation.
In a widely read essay called “Mission Creep: 3D Printing Will Not Save Your Library,” Australian academic librarian Hugh Rundle takes aim at what he calls the “technolust and the fear of being left behind.”
In another essay, he writes, “As librarians it is easy for us to be seduced by new technologies and inadvertently undermine the values we should be protecting.”
Rundle argues there is no compelling reason for libraries to provide 3D printing services — at least not yet. The consumer printers have a limited print range and are notoriously slow and error prone.
And librarians typically don’t have the expertise necessary to maintain the machines and use their design software, much less set up MediaMaker Labs like the one in Middleton.
This could explain why libraries aren’t clamoring for the technology. Only two libraries in Dane County — Middleton and Black Earth — have them, and both currently have a limited public use.
“It all depends on the individual communities and who the library is serving,” says Miller. “They aren’t right for every library.”
In 2011, Miller was hired as executive director of the Sauk City library to help make it “more of an interactive place of creation.”
“Three-dimensional printing was seen as easy, low-hanging fruit to get to that point,” he says.
Miller gave patrons unrestricted access to the printer. During a two-year period, he says, the machine logged around 600 printing-hours or 25 days, most devoted to printing Minecraft and Halo uploads.
But the real challenge for libraries, Miller says, is how to provide meaningful instruction around the technology. He doesn’t see much value in simply keeping them on display or offering print-on-demand services.
“Getting a little plastic trinket shouldn’t be the end result,” he says. “The end result should be empowering and teaching people to use this technology.”
Miller, now the assistant director of Resources for Libraries and Lifelong Learning, a division of the state Department of Public Instruction, says that as schools incorporate 3D design and printing into their curriculums, access to printers and software will create equity issues for students whose parents can’t afford computers, much less a 3D printer.
“It’s important for libraries to provide equipment that is corresponding with what is going on in the schools,” he says. “A library is a place to level that playing field so kids can practice and have that leg up.”
Middleton’s library last summer began offering grade school students the chance to learn the basics of three-dimensional design.
“I like to have students on the creative side of the technology,” says volunteer instructor Brian Miles, a computer applications teacher at Glacier Creek Middle School. “A lot of problem-solving takes place before they’re ready to print.”
On a recent Tuesday, Miles’ students each designed and printed a part for a Rube Goldberg-type machine they designed as a group.
Miller recalls a teenage boy in Sauk City who designed and printed a spare razor guard for his mother, who had to buy a whole razor set when a guard broke. The boy would return to the library to make small adjustments after running home with a prototype that didn’t quite fit until he got it right.
“It’s that sense of breaking things down into distinct tasks and being able to do it,” Miller says. “These skills will serve kids for the rest of their life for solving any problem or task they come upon.”
