Harry P.

Ditto, x2 and amen. These days, with all the sources of information available to the consumer, there's no excuse for any "surprise" when you buy a kit.

Yeah, Tom Brady.

Very nice, as usual from you! The faces on the figures are especially well done.

Tom Brady has just thrown his 6th TD of the game. See ya next year, Denver...

Tebow's a good guy... not quite ready for prime time, but he'll get better.

Stick around. It won't be very long.

It's really an amazing thing in every way!

Tim Tebow and the Broncos are getting their butts kicked all the way back to the Rockies. Tom Brady just set an all-time NFL playoff game record with 5 TDs in the first half! New England leads Denver 35-7 at halftime. Yikes!

The technology today is sort of in the "Model T" stage. It will be refined, costs will drop dramatically, and soon 3D printing will be as common and cheap as cell phones and ipods are today. This technology is going to explode, and I am sure the model kit industry is going to be fundamentally changed forever by it.

ok, I have a few questions. I think someone else mentioned this already... but I don't see any cover over this. The video says it's 1,300 sq. meters. How do they keep it clean? How do they keep dust off? Also, if something breaks down in the middle of the layout somewhere, how do they get to the spot and fix it? There's no way a person has enough room to walk onto the layout without crushing parts of it... so how do they have access to the interior parts of the layout?

That's gotta be the most amazing scale model anything I've ever seen. It's so completely over-the-top cool, I can't even think of a good way to describe it. It's definitely something you have to see in person to fully appreciate. Unbelievably cool!

Hobby Lobby has them. Or at least they used to, last time I looked.

If you print out your digital photos on a crummy printer, is that the camera manufacturer's problem? If you buy a movie on DVD and play it on a crummy TV, is that the DVD manufacturer's fault? If you buy a kit in digital file form, the model company has made their sale. If you decide to print out that file on a low-quality printer, it's not the fault of the company that sold you the file.

Where did you get that from???!!!

Why? Why support a system that offers less selection and (generally) higher prices than a system that offers virtually unlimited selection, generally lower prices, and 24 hour convenience? I really don't see why so many of you insist we "support" a business model that has obviously been surpassed by a better system in every way. Is it nostalgia, maybe? Wanting things to be the way they used to be? Or the way we are used to them being? I don't know... when I add up the advantages of online shopping vs. shopping at the LHS, to me it's no contest.

The details will be worked out. It's easy enough to set up a website download center and control the number of downloads from a given IP address. There are probably other ways to control downloads, too... and if they don't exist now, they will in the future. This 3D output technology is going to be big, not just in the world of model cars. I see all sorts of applications in both the consumer and industrial/commercial area. It seems like a natural for the model companies. They wouldn't need factories, injection-molding machines, packaging, shipping, etc. They sell us a download that includes the parts data, the decal sheets and the instructions. Since there would be no more need to cut tooling, that whole process (and the cost associated) is eliminated. Theoretically the model companies cound produce far more kits for less money than they can produce now using current technology and current production costs. We could see new releases monthly (or even more often), not yearly. Let's say I buy that 1/8 Superbird and somehow I mess up a part (or break it or lose it). No more writing to the model company asking for a replacement, or posting a "part wanted" thread here. I just go to my digital kit file, look up the part number of the piece I need, and print out a replacement piece. If I mess up the paint job, I don't have to bother with stripping the paint... I just toss the body and print myself a new one! It's a win-win for the model compaies and the consumer. The companies can produce and sell kits for much less money than it costs them now, because they no longer have to produce, package and ship actual, physical kits; they just have to produce the digital files. And the convenience for the consumer would be fantastic. I'm almost positive that it's going to be the way we buy models in the not-too-distant future.

Exactly. A "model kit" would be a digital file with all the info for the printer on it. Companies could even offer downloads of "kits" on their websites. The customer downloads the file, prints the parts out on their desktop 3D printer, and there's your model kit, ready to assemble! It's going to happen, just as technology is changing the music industry. The appearance of digital music files (mp3) changed the whole way the music business operates. No more factories churning out physical CDs and the associated packaging, which then have to be distributed to retailers, which then have to be bought by consumers. You want the latest work from your favorite band? All you have to do is download the digital files and you have it, ready to go into your ipod or whatever. Same thing is happening to movies. Remember the corner "video store?" A rapidly disappearing thing of the past. Now you download movies directly to your computer. The future of model kits is going to go the same way.

What if DOH never happened and we never had to wade through a General Lee thread, ever?

Looks like I stumped you guys this time... only 7 correct answers! The car is a 1966 Otsan Anadol A1 from Turkey. http://autos.in.msn.com/gallery/photoviewer.aspx?cp-documentid=5452063&page=34 Who got it right: trogdor MikeMc ChrisR carsntrucks4you Badluck 13 mr chips Johnny

One day not too far away these 3D printers will be as cheap and common as a "normal" 2D printer is. We'll be outputting our own model kits right on our desktop. On a recent episode of "This Old House," the architectural model they were showing was done on a 3D printer...the model was fully detailed inside and out. Wall colors, doors and windows, stairways, the works. It was amazing to think how that model was made, compared to the old-fashioned way of actually cutting out pieces of fomecore and literally building the model piece by piece.

There's definitely something to be said for low tech, too. Reading a book on a Kindle isn't the same as reading the "real" book. Yeah, the words are the same, but the experience is different. It's a nice change of pace to have an activity where there is absolutely no high-tech involved. Oh well... time to go churn me some butter...

My DVR is supplied by the cable company. Is there a way to download stuff off the DVR like you can download stuff off a hard drive?

Change banks!

I mean, why would anyone who doesn't have to want to?

One of the new technologies I really like is the DVR ("tivo" to some people). If there's a show you like, you program the DVR to record the show, then you can watch any time you like, but the best part is, you can fly through all the commercials in super-fast-forward. I can watch a 3 hour NFL game in 45 minutes!