Hey,
my name is Ruven Bals. Im the original creator of the Gear Ball model.
I think everyone has seen the winner of the maths contest by now:
I have filed multiple reports at this point. I even showed proof that this guy broke my license and even blackmailed me.
Is MakerWorld a platform that promots illegal activity?
It’s a very obvious copy of my model. Giving this guy a prize for that is completely beyond me.
What do you guys think?
Hi RuvenBals, I have also reported the model and makerworld has said that they are different even though it looks identical.
Is the concept of the ball entirely your original idea, or has it been discussed by mathematicians or others before?
Do you still have that chat? Because knowingly letting a copy win is even more of a scandal.
That would mean we have MakerWorld active promoting model theft.
I will list the similarities:
Same concept.
Same Gears
Same Gear ratio
Same assembly
He just cut out a “Rhombo” wich is a ridiculous small change to avoid a complete copy.
The Ball is entirely my idea. That model probably wouldn’t have existed for a long time without me.
Exactly, He just cut some sides and called it a Rhombo. Nothing new
First off, very impressive!
While I haven’t printed any of the variants yet, just by examining the model, I can confidently say it is a copy. Technically, it might not be considered a remix if none of your STL files were used directly.
However, there is a potential issue: a gear cube with a similar mechanism has been around since 2011. Although transforming it into a sphere is an interesting twist, it may not be as original as it initially appears. Am I wrong?
Having said that, given that it is an obvious copy, it should not be eligible for prizes in a contest.
MakerWorld is using drastic measures here. Before, I uploaded a model to the OpenSCAD competition which was customisable and was relevant but some person reported me of having an irrelevant model to the contest and MakerWorld just deducted 100 points. I even emailed them about the case and they said nothing, but when I report something, they just act like everything is fine and ignore it.
Its not so obvious as you think. It took 2 weeks just to come up with the idea. Sure i also got inspired by emmet but its s completely different thing.
They never even got back to me. They just ignored everything i did. Thats a lovely way to treat the Guy that made their most popular model in recent times.
This thing is now more popular then the original. Imagine how much money this cost me.
Okay. Hard to tell for me but I believe you.
@MakerWorld
I think this topic requires an official statement.
Yes, I think that MakerWorld should say something here
I have searched the entire web and I haven’t found anything similar to Ruven bals models
The concept is not new.
Here is an example of this concept.
the designer also has other forms.
I looked at the models, the model on makerworld is very much inspired by the Ruvens model. Even almost brazen. But Ruvens’ model is also inspired by Emmett. But you can see that the models from “trynottobreakanything” look as if they were newly created. So this is not a remix or a copy.
This has happened to me several times myself, so I understand Ruvens, it’s annoying that such a similar model wins a competition, but it’s not a copy, it’s just the same concept.
I’m excited to see what happens next here…
If I start checking models on Makerworld, especially those entered in contests I quite often find things that seem familiar.
In some cases I bother to download the model and see confirmed that it is way too similar to not be a fake that was stolen somewhere.
For a while I actually bothered to report offenders in support of the original creator probably having no clue what is happening.
I ALWAYS provided links to the original model and applied licence.
All reports were rejected based on the claim the model would be different.
When I spotted a very old model of mine highlighted by the author as his own idea and creation I was a bit fed off.
Fair enough, I provided the model for free back in the day and with the standard license for only personal use.
So I gave Markerworld my original files that showed the creation date in order to validate my claim.
In return I got hear the usual IS different excuse.
Hmm…
It has an almost identical name, does the same and looks the same, even comes with the same instructions to assemble it…
Then I loaded MY model into studio, sliced it and all to be saved as a 3MF file.
From that 3MF file I exported the STL file…
It had a stunningly close match to what the copycat claimed to be his great work.
He did not win anything with my model in the contest he entered and Makerworld did not act on my claims either.
But a few weeks later his models disappeared followed by his account.
Till then I enjoyed the many rants in the comments of his uploads accusing him of that model being stolen…
I contacted Makerworld and asked if they eventually did act on my report.
“The user decided to no longer share his models and to terminate his account.”
Considering the volume of claims here and on other internet platforms I struggle to see that Bambu and Makerworld have any real intentions to stop this.
Too little too late means the platform is already overrun by copycats and those only posting (often still stolen and mostly unchanged models) to get an advantage.
What concerns me here is that far too many of them manage to get seemingly impossible download counts and such.
But you never see any makes and if you do than from users that never uploaded a creation of their own.
The images of those makes are usually in a quality making it impossible to tell whether or not it is a real print.
Sure enough, a quick check in those areas Google does not send bots into reveals there is dedicated bots available.
Set a download address and the bots keeps getting ew IP addresses, downloads the files and pastes a comment or such from a little database to match.
If you are bit more experienced than the advanced settings allow for more human like interaction of the bot.
Makerworld makes it easy by having all relevant buttons in always the same fixed spot on the page.
Even a simple makro to simulate the mouse will do just fine.
Set the random delay between downloads and every now and then post something meaningless and Bob’s your aunty.
I was stupid and tried to make a suggestion to their great support team.
Simply link ALL relevant statistics that allow a user to make a gain to ONLY fully registered and VERIFIED users who ALSO actually printed the model.
Quality over quantity.
My point was that if there is anything of any kind the downloading users would have to register here anyway.
Makerworld stated that this would be a severe limitation and also that it would bee seen as promoting the Makerworld users that qualify.
Isn’t it funny how different the view on quality and quality control can be once those in charge rely on Chinese wisdom based on no copyrights of any kind ?
Of course the concept is new. Everything Emmett made is symmetrical. I intentionally use asymmetrie to make my designs interesting.
Hi, thanks for pointing this out. We understand your frustration and is here to provide our explanation.
This type of gear cube with such particular mechanism has been around the for quite some time now, however it has not quite been introduced to MakerWorld yet.
The author claimed in his description that the mechanisms were inspired by you and Emmett, and after evaluation we believed that his model was not a remix nor a copy of your’s or Emmett’s model.
Our judges believed that this model represents the theme of this contest, which is to demonstrate 'the elegance and intricacy of mathematical concepts through the art of 3D printing.
However, we understand your frustration here and will further evaluate the situation. Thank you very much for pointing this out, there will be actions taken.
Hey @Ri0m0 First off I seen your model on social media awhile ago as it popped in one of my feeds and even had numerous people share the link, awesome concept and engineering behind that which you should be shown gratitude for.
Now onto your post, this instance imo would follow under what MakerWorld would/has assumed already which is this falls under a "remix". I’ve reported a similar situation with a designer that striped the “concept” of a fidget model which was already done by STLFLIX and the users model functioned the same and was 100% identical to theirs.
The reply I received was identical to @ExpeditionLabs response from MW. They found no violations, designer claims he had no idea of the model being already in existence (if you’re a designer and 3D printing enthusiast, you know very well what models are out there already…) So I disagree with MakerWorld’s take on this decision, but if were going to be technical and follow “Law” well you’d have to provide evidence of a “patent” from what I’m aware of.
If someone else can clarify that within MakerWorld’s guidelines or terms and conditions of which they state “Models must be original designs, not based on other concepts from different makers” I think the contest user was allowed to do this.
All of this is really vague still and copyrighting within this industry is only reachable by a very very few amount, so this is my opinion so anyone else that can elaborate please I’d appreciate it.
This is asymmetrical to me and this is from Emmett from 2011.
His models are also asymmetrical, so what exactly do you mean?
This is your first model of this kind from this year.
This is Emmett’s model from 2011.
Models are different but the concept is the same.
I’m not trying to attack you. I just want to know what you mean.
