mikailborg | Little powdery people (Reply)

In case you hadn't heard, we have indeed invented the Star Trek replicator. Of course, it's expensive, slow, and only works on solid objects, plus the results are a bit fragile. But, one step at a time, right?

A company known as FigurePrints is using this first-generation technology to sell gamers unique figurines of their World of Warcraft characters. The service is so popular that they've had to establish a lottery for accepting orders, even with round-the-clock production. Customers dress their characters in their favorite gear and submit the orders; the figure company retrieves (with permission) 3-D model information from Blizzard, then does a little touchup to cover gaps and clipping artifacts. In a bath of extremely fine powder, something much like an inkjet printer head sprays layers of colored glue, and after some hours, the figure is gently removed from the bath and cleaned up a bit. The result looks like the picture on the right (click it to embiggen).

So, if you play WoW, would you pay $130 for one of these? Does your character have the outfit you'd want to see it in? Would you get one if it were available for another game? Would you get one when the technology gets a little better? Expound!