The Free Universal Construction Kit

These kits can have extraordinary longevity. I was playing with Lincoln Logs in 1967. Turns out they got started in 1918. Lego bricks have been around since 1945. The moat created by seriously delighting your customers at a young age is large.

Very cool. Do two copyright infringements (one on each side of the adapter) cancel each other out? I really like it!

> Note: all units are in inches.

Not so universal as I'd hoped, but I love the concept and the organization behind it, Free Art and Technology Lab.

Super cool, lock-in is very real. We are overflowing with Duplo and Lego sets because I just don't want to deal with another system. There are, of course, other models on Thingiverse, Printables, etc., but knowing these are properly designed to fit and work is a huge plus. Cudos to the team!

That's an awesome project. I'm sure there are many kids that have been gifted LEGO knockoffs that are not compatible with legos from adults that didn't know any better. A similar "interop" project for those would be great

No Construx? I built everything out of those as a kid.

When I was a kid I used to rate my uncles and aunts based off who got me Legos or Megablocks.

Idk how I’d feel if they got me this.

I feel like the only way to summon the corporate lawyers faster would be to put a Mickey mouse on the box.

Tell your kids about FUCK, the most fun way to play with them bricks...

Neat idea, but as an adult who builds little machines out of Lego Technic for fun sometimes, the adapter selection seems very limited. In order to make this idea "practical" you would need adapters with a variety of sizes, shapes, and orientations. I guess I'm not the target audience - I can definitely see this being cool for children.

Almost all (back then, I hear the clone quality is much higher now) were "compatible" but had little to no clutch power, a wall built with some of them would inevitably break at the clone bricks.

When I was a kid I used to rate my uncles and aunts based off who got me Legos or Megablocks.

Idk how I’d feel if they got me this.

I was so confused recently, when I bought a toy car kit from some German brand which cost 25 euro and came with the pieces all joined together straight from the injection mold, so you had to twist them off one by one, and then the little injection spikes stabbed your fingers while you worked.

Bought an almost equivalent set from Lego (stab-free!) for 9 euro. How does that pricing make sense haha

It is a really nice concept. I had never heard of it. But then as GenX at young age I played with Fishertechnik [0] more than with Lego. Around since 1966 [1].

[0] https://www.fischertechnik.de/en

[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fischertechnik

> The moat created by seriously delighting your customers at a young age is large.

I'm not sure that's enough: most kids wouldn't be able to tell a genuine Lego brick from a knock-off.

(Lego famously has insane quality control on their tolerances. But I haven't had any trouble with knock-off bricks so far either.)

Don't forget Erector Sets.

I spend untold hours failing to build a cable tramway between my mother's dresser and bed.

But at least now I'm an expert at pylon design!

> The moat created by seriously delighting your customers at a young age is large.

I wish Meccano would get its shit together. I can’t see anything I want on their limited site and there is so much cool stuff that could be made.

https://www.meccano.com/

Zometool rules!

I run workshops about the use of modular systems in facilitating non-expert participation in architecture. One I did (at the CAAD Futures Conference in 2023) was with Zometool. It was a blast and really successful.

In preparation I also got to interview the late great Steve Baer, inventor of the Zome (among many other things - seriously look him up, he's one of the most brilliant people of the past 100 years imo). It was a huge honor.

The book chapter the organizers were supposed to do about the conference workshops never materialized (hrmph), but I've done other little collaborative build projects since, so one day I'll document them all together.

This kit is how I discovered zometool ten years ago and still find it fascinating. Its amazing! Check out vZome and its associated discord. FOSS virtualzome builder and symmetry study tool.

Any George Hart aficionados around..?

yeah I dig it a fair bit. It's good for making jigs for carpenting geometric stuff. Those funny angles.

> Note: all units are in inches.

Not so universal as I'd hoped, but I love the concept and the organization behind it, Free Art and Technology Lab.

Is this complaint just for the sake of complaining? You print out the pieces, they connect various toys together. The units could be light-years for all it matters.

There's this universal constant 2.54 you can use it to divide any value in inches and badabing you get the value in centimeters

up until very recently, the only units that made it even remotely "universal" was US customary units. Or, as Arduino Vs Everyone on youtube says: "units that have gone to the moon."

Now, i speak larger measurements in metric if i think the person i am talking to understands or doesn't care; but short measurements i still use "quarter inch" or "teenth" or "thou" pronounced like "wow", from the beginning of "thousandth".

I know km, liters - i drink at least 3 liters of liquid a day, if not 4, but i drink it 1 quart beverage receptacle at a time, odd how that fits!

is it really so hard to have a ruler with both measurements? I have a ruler that lets you convert from font point to two other measurement units to inches, for page layout.

I'm american, from the '80s, and we never used metric day-to-day.

the US will be US customary units basically forever. because we're an absolutely massive geography, and there's hundreds of thousands, if not millions of mile markers, speed limit signs, "distance to" signs, speed warning signs, gas stations, etc.

So 2026 is the year where i finally say: Please, please, shut up about this. No one cares.

Almost all (back then, I hear the clone quality is much higher now) were "compatible" but had little to no clutch power, a wall built with some of them would inevitably break at the clone bricks.

Crappy tolerance in the clone parts. I hear the clones got much better now.

That’s the joy of 3d printing. You can adapt these to any adapter if you need it.

Crappy tolerance in the clone parts. I hear the clones got much better now.

yeah I dig it a fair bit. It's good for making jigs for carpenting geometric stuff. Those funny angles.

Tell your kids about FUCK, the most fun way to play with them bricks...

I was going to say something about the choice of acronym for the project, but, well, a couple people figured it out. :D

Do you mean leaving them on a hard floor so a parent can injure their heel stepping on one at night?

I feel like the only way to summon the corporate lawyers faster would be to put a Mickey mouse on the box.

Mickey mouse is in the public domain, at last!

If you go to the homepage (or look at the banner) the project is shut down since 2015.

https://fffff.at/rip/

No Construx? I built everything out of those as a kid.

Ditto. My kids are still pretty young, and my old Construx are one of the favorite building toys.

Very cool. Do two copyright infringements (one on each side of the adapter) cancel each other out? I really like it!

There is some interoperability provision to patents and copyright in European union if I remember correctly but I don't know how broad they are and if they apply to this.

At least Lego‘s patent on the bricks expired. You can’t make mini figures but bricks shouldn’t be a problem

It is a really nice concept. I had never heard of it. But then as GenX at young age I played with Fishertechnik [0] more than with Lego. Around since 1966 [1].

[0] https://www.fischertechnik.de/en

[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fischertechnik

Construx is what I played with. It was only sold for a few years.

Is this complaint just for the sake of complaining? You print out the pieces, they connect various toys together. The units could be light-years for all it matters.

up until very recently, the only units that made it even remotely "universal" was US customary units. Or, as Arduino Vs Everyone on youtube says: "units that have gone to the moon."

I know km, liters - i drink at least 3 liters of liquid a day, if not 4, but i drink it 1 quart beverage receptacle at a time, odd how that fits!

is it really so hard to have a ruler with both measurements? I have a ruler that lets you convert from font point to two other measurement units to inches, for page layout.

I'm american, from the '80s, and we never used metric day-to-day.

So 2026 is the year where i finally say: Please, please, shut up about this. No one cares.

That’s the joy of 3d printing. You can adapt these to any adapter if you need it.

There's something about the internet that makes people want to moan in public about nothing.

Whenever I see someone in a current British television show use "inches" or "feet," I'm reminded of the HN metric mafia that insists that the United States is the only place in the world that uses imperial units.

Even Wikipedia will tell you that's false.

> is it really so hard to have a ruler with both measurements? I have a ruler that lets you convert from font point to two other measurement units to inches, for page layout.

The problem with the imperial unit system rather is that it does not form something "to build more complicated units out of".

For example: if you want inch (in) as a unit, why not have "in^2" as a corresponding small area unit and "in^3" as corresponding volume unit?

Additionally, there should be constant/regular conversion factors between the various subunits of a measure, i.e.

  10^-3 km = 1 m = 10 dm = 100 cm = 1000 mm = 10^6 µm = 10^9 nm = ...

  1 lea = 3 mi = 24 fur = 240 ch = 5280 yd = 15840 ft = ...

I can't take seriously anyone who measures butter by volume

> The moat created by seriously delighting your customers at a young age is large.

I wish Meccano would get its shit together. I can’t see anything I want on their limited site and there is so much cool stuff that could be made.

https://www.meccano.com/

Don't forget Erector Sets.

I spend untold hours failing to build a cable tramway between my mother's dresser and bed.

But at least now I'm an expert at pylon design!

Any George Hart aficionados around..?

For the longest time I did not know that Vi was his daughter.

This kit is how I discovered zometool ten years ago and still find it fascinating. Its amazing! Check out vZome and its associated discord. FOSS virtualzome builder and symmetry study tool.

> The moat created by seriously delighting your customers at a young age is large.

I'm not sure that's enough: most kids wouldn't be able to tell a genuine Lego brick from a knock-off.

(Lego famously has insane quality control on their tolerances. But I haven't had any trouble with knock-off bricks so far either.)

Zometool rules!

Thanks a bunch. I did not know about vZome. Thanks for the introduction.

I'm sure that Lego still captures virtually all of the revenue in this category, no?

Fantastic ! Would love to read more about your experiences.

If you go to the homepage (or look at the banner) the project is shut down since 2015.

https://fffff.at/rip/

I was going to say something about the choice of acronym for the project, but, well, a couple people figured it out. :D

Do you mean leaving them on a hard floor so a parent can injure their heel stepping on one at night?

Special high intensity training!

Mickey mouse is in the public domain, at last!

I think they would have a very strong case that using the mouse on a product is likely to confuse consumers about the origin of the product and therefore infringe on their trademark.

There's this universal constant 2.54 you can use it to divide any value in inches and badabing you get the value in centimeters

Ditto. My kids are still pretty young, and my old Construx are one of the favorite building toys.

There is some interoperability provision to patents and copyright in European union if I remember correctly but I don't know how broad they are and if they apply to this.

Construx is what I played with. It was only sold for a few years.

For the longest time I did not know that Vi was his daughter.

I can't take seriously anyone who measures butter by volume

I've been cooking for something like a quarter century, for multiple people, and i have never once, in my life, used a kitchen scale. I have one for doing METRIC measurements of ratios of liquids for other uses, but not once for cooking.

A stick of butter is a quarter pound. it doesn't matter though, because the butter is marked in "recipe increments". if you melt it, you can use "tablespoons" to measure it, literally.

eta: i haven't even used measuring cups or spoons for anything in like a decade, unless i am making bread or bread-like things.

There's something about the internet that makes people want to moan in public about nothing.

Even Wikipedia will tell you that's false.

Every post/comment is selecting across 100,000+ people worldwide for the individuals most likely to complain about it.

There’s no other place on earth I can invite 100,000 people to disagree with me. Exception is maybe a public office. (Which the vast majority of people shy away from, for just this reason)

At least Lego‘s patent on the bricks expired. You can’t make mini figures but bricks shouldn’t be a problem

> is it really so hard to have a ruler with both measurements? I have a ruler that lets you convert from font point to two other measurement units to inches, for page layout.

The problem with the imperial unit system rather is that it does not form something "to build more complicated units out of".

For example: if you want inch (in) as a unit, why not have "in^2" as a corresponding small area unit and "in^3" as corresponding volume unit?

Additionally, there should be constant/regular conversion factors between the various subunits of a measure, i.e.

  10^-3 km = 1 m = 10 dm = 100 cm = 1000 mm = 10^6 µm = 10^9 nm = ...

  1 lea = 3 mi = 24 fur = 240 ch = 5280 yd = 15840 ft = ...

Thanks a bunch. I did not know about vZome. Thanks for the introduction.

Well done indeed

I hope that Lego (not lawyers ofc) would appreciate such creativity approach and hire creators. (E.g. similar to acquihire of OpenClaw creator by OpenAI.)

How many of us do think this way?

I am always jealous (in good way) when I see similar projects.

Indeed Amazon is chock full of shitty Chinese Lego ripoffs. The bricks do indeed fit together but the quality is abysmal.

we don't use leagues or furlongs. I know what a chain is because i have one, but that's specifically to measure land against a plat map. Every location in this country is based off common reference locations (there's a literal marker on the ground), with only chains and angles to delimit things (generally).

Read that last part again, because they use GPS to determine if the marker has moved, and that takes X minutes to quiesce. you can't take X*Y minutes to check each chain mark and angle.. not all land is rectilinear. we have a bit less than ten million km^2 of land in this country.

I'd reckon that maybe 1% of Americans know what a league is, as in the definition. Less for "furlong", less for "chain".

This is how these conversations go, usually. It's completely pointless, most of the people here will never interface with something where this matters. I'm a few decades old - 2.25 score years old, to be accurate. My wife knows what a score is, and how many feet in a mile, which i can never remember; by the by, it's about 5300 feet.

like Celsius, the metric measurements don't "mean" anything directly to a human. a meter is how fast light travels in 1/speedoflightinmeterspersecond. water boils at 100 and freezes at 0. compare to ~100F "roughly median body temperature", "roughly the length of an adult foot", and "roughly the length of the middle bone in your thumb".

yes, for "science" using units that convert is great, one of my favorite things to read is the Frink language unit file for that reason. Metric is cute and ostensibly "well-defined". great, use it.

you're not getting ~400,000,000 people to switch, potentially ever. The sheer cost is astronomical. a speed limit sign, just the sign is ~$22. The total cost of install could be from $500 to $3000. Per speed limit sign. There's at least 10,000 speed limit signs on interstates alone. [nearly] Every single mile of every single highway and interstate in the US has a reflective sign stating what mile it is - except for mile 420, i'm not sure why, that'll be missing but there will be a 419.7 mile marker. weird.

> In 2002, a contractor installed just over 50 miles’ worth of markers on I-78 and Routes 22 and 33 at a cost of $230,000, or about $4,500 per mile. Today, [...] $6,500 per mile, said PennDOT spokesman Ron Young.

and

> As of 2022, [...] the Interstate Highway System, which has a total length of 48,890 miles (78,680 km)

and that's just interstates. We have expressways, freeways, spurs, feeders, highways, state roads that use mile markers. Speed limit signs vary in distance, but figure 2 miles per (raelly 1 per mile since they're on both directions of travel, and usually there's 2 per direction, one on either shoulder) on nearly every commute surface. we have ~2,600,000 miles of paved roads, and a bit over 4,000,000 miles of roads, total, in the US - that's 6.437376e+6 kilometers, or 21 lightseconds in a vacuum, or 32 lightseconds in fiber optic cable. 32000ms ping, awesome.

Every house in the US is built with 16" on-center framing for the walls. we're not going to switch to "406.4mm on center", because our sheetrock, plywood, etc are all 48"x96".

every other country that switched did it 70+ years ago, has less people, or is drastically smaller.

like i said, rudely, but now politely, give it up, we're staying with our US customary units.

Fantastic ! Would love to read more about your experiences.

I'm sure that Lego still captures virtually all of the revenue in this category, no?

Maybe, I'm not sure. Though Wikipedia demonstrates that you don

Special high intensity training!

SHIT.. I figured that one..

I think they would have a very strong case that using the mouse on a product is likely to confuse consumers about the origin of the product and therefore infringe on their trademark.

Nah, Disney seems to be genuinely letting it go. Amazon and other sites are flooded with Steamboat Willie merchandise at this point.

In fact I play cornhole competitively, and last year I picked up a set of Steamboat Willie themed bags:

https://www.logiccornhole.com/products/steamboat-willie-colo...

A stick of butter is a quarter pound. it doesn't matter though, because the butter is marked in "recipe increments". if you melt it, you can use "tablespoons" to measure it, literally.

eta: i haven't even used measuring cups or spoons for anything in like a decade, unless i am making bread or bread-like things.

Every post/comment is selecting across 100,000+ people worldwide for the individuals most likely to complain about it.

There’s no other place on earth I can invite 100,000 people to disagree with me. Exception is maybe a public office. (Which the vast majority of people shy away from, for just this reason)

Well done indeed

I hope that Lego (not lawyers ofc) would appreciate such creativity approach and hire creators. (E.g. similar to acquihire of OpenClaw creator by OpenAI.)

How many of us do think this way?

I am always jealous (in good way) when I see similar projects.

Indeed Amazon is chock full of shitty Chinese Lego ripoffs. The bricks do indeed fit together but the quality is abysmal.

Some of the Chinese brands have superior quality to LEGO these days.

I'd reckon that maybe 1% of Americans know what a league is, as in the definition. Less for "furlong", less for "chain".

yes, for "science" using units that convert is great, one of my favorite things to read is the Frink language unit file for that reason. Metric is cute and ostensibly "well-defined". great, use it.

and

> As of 2022, [...] the Interstate Highway System, which has a total length of 48,890 miles (78,680 km)

Every house in the US is built with 16" on-center framing for the walls. we're not going to switch to "406.4mm on center", because our sheetrock, plywood, etc are all 48"x96".

every other country that switched did it 70+ years ago, has less people, or is drastically smaller.

like i said, rudely, but now politely, give it up, we're staying with our US customary units.

> we don't use leagues or furlongs. I know what a chain is because i have one, but that's specifically to measure land against a plat map. Every location in this country is based off common reference locations (there's a literal marker on the ground)

The same holds for more obscure unit prefixes in the SI system like dam (decameter) or hm (hectometer) in the SI unit system (as far as I am aware, the only common usage of the "deca" prefix is in Austria for "decagram" (dag)).

Nevertheless, even these obscure units fit the regular pattern perfectly:

1 km = 10 hm = 100 dam = 1000 m

- and this was my point.

Maybe, I'm not sure. Though Wikipedia demonstrates that you don

SHIT.. I figured that one..

Nah, Disney seems to be genuinely letting it go. Amazon and other sites are flooded with Steamboat Willie merchandise at this point.

In fact I play cornhole competitively, and last year I picked up a set of Steamboat Willie themed bags:

https://www.logiccornhole.com/products/steamboat-willie-colo...

Some of the Chinese brands have superior quality to LEGO these days.

Nevertheless, even these obscure units fit the regular pattern perfectly:

1 km = 10 hm = 100 dam = 1000 m

- and this was my point.

Ever wanted to connect your Legos and Tinkertoys together? Now you can â€” and much more. Announcing the Free Universal Construction Kit: a set of adapters for complete interoperability between 10 popular construction toys.

Fig. 1. The Free Universal Construction Kit.

Overview
Motivation
Download
Implementation
Legal and Commercial Implications
License and Disclaimers
Credits, Contact and Acknowledgements
Keywords

Overview

Video by Riley Harmon for F.A.T. Lab + Sy-Lab.

F.A.T. Lab and Sy-Lab are pleased to present the Free Universal Construction Kit: a matrix of nearly 80 adapter bricks that enable complete interoperability between ten* popular childrenâ€™s construction toys. By allowing any piece to join to any other, the Kit encourages totally new forms of intercourse between otherwise closed systemsâ€”enabling radically hybrid constructive play, the creation of previously impossible designs, and ultimately, more creative opportunities for kids. As with other grassroots interoperability remedies, the Free Universal Construction Kit implements proprietary protocols in order to provide a public service unmetâ€”or unmeetableâ€”by corporate interests.

The Free Universal Construction Kit offers adapters between Lego, Duplo, Fischertechnik, Gears! Gears! Gears!, Kâ€™Nex, Krinkles (Bristle Blocks), Lincoln Logs, Tinkertoys, Zome, and Zoob. Our adapters can be downloaded from Thingiverse.com and other sharing sites as a set of 3D models in .STL format, suitable for reproduction by personal manufacturing devices like the Makerbot (an inexpensive, open-source 3D printer).

Motivation

Our kids are already doing it! And when we were growing up, ourselves, we did it tooâ€”or we tried to, anyway. Connecting our toys together. Because: what if we want to make a construction which is half-Tinkertoys, half-Kâ€™Nex? Why shouldnâ€™t we be able to? We dreamed about this possibility years ago, when we were small, and we knew then, as we know now, that weâ€™d need some adapters to help. The advent of low-cost 3D printing has made such adapters possible, and with it, a vast new set of combinatorial possibilities for childrenâ€™s creative construction toys.

Opening doors to new creative worlds is one major reason we created the Free Universal Construction Kit. Another is that we believe expertise shouldnâ€™t be disposable â€” and that childrensâ€™ hard-won creative fluency with their toys shouldnâ€™t become obsolete each Christmas. By allowing different toy systems to work together, the Free Universal Construction Kit makes possible new forms of â€œforward compatibilityâ€, extending the value of these systems across the life of a child. Thus, with the Kitâ€™s adapters, playsets like Krinkles (often enjoyed by toddlers) can still retain their use-value for older children using Lego, and for even older tweens using Zome.

The Kit offers a â€œbest of all worldsâ€ approach to play and learning that combines the advantages of each toy system. We selected construction sets for inclusion based on their significant level of market penetration, as well as for the diversity of features they brought to the Kitâ€™s collection. Some of the supported construction systems, for example, offer great mechanical strength, or the ability to build at large scales; others offer the means to design kinetic movements; and still others permit the creation of a wide range of crystallographic geometries and symmetries. Using these classic toys as a foundation, the Free Universal Construction Kit offers a â€œmeta-mashup systemâ€ ideally provisioned for the creation of transgressive architecture and chimeric readymades.

Finally, in producing the Free Universal Construction Kit, we hope to demonstrate a model of reverse engineering as a civic activity: a creative process in which anyone can develop the necessary pieces to bridge the limitations presented by mass-produced commercial artifacts. We hope that the Kit will not only prompt people to create new designs, but more importantly, to reflect on our relationship with material mass-cultureâ€”and the rapidly-evolving ways in which we can better adapt it to our imaginations.

Download

The Free Universal Construction Kit 3D models are freely available in .STL format from three locations:

Individual adapters from the Free Universal Construction Kit may be downloaded from Thingiverse.com â€” the worldâ€™s foremost website dedicated to the free sharing and remixing of user-created digital design files.
The complete Free Universal Construction Kit can also be downloaded in its entirety*, as a 29MB .zip archive from the F.A.T. Lab web site, here. Note: all units are in inches.
We expect the Kit to be available shortly from The Pirate Bay, as a torrent in TPBâ€™s new "physibles" (physical downloadables) channel****.

In addition to the Kit itself, we also offer for download this attractive B1 poster (4.5MB PDF, in two versions: gray background / white background).

Figure 2. The Free Universal Construction Kit adapter matrix. (PDFs: Gray, White)

We (F.A.T. Lab and Sy-Lab) neither sell nor distribute physical copies of the Free Universal Construction Kit. Please do not ask us to do so. Individuals seeking their own physical copies of the Kit, in whole or in part, are encouraged to download our files and reproduce them with open-hardware desktop 3D printers like the Makerbot, RepRap, Ultimaker, or Printrbot. Alternatively, copies for private use may be available from a personal fabrication service bureau; for awesome service, international/anywhere shipping and quick turnaround, we highly recommend Ponoko.com for personalized 3D printing in a wide variety of materials. Shapeways and QuickParts are good, too. You may also find a 3D printer in the architecture, industrial design, and/or mechanical engineering departments of your local university.

Please note that our license for the Free Universal Construction Kit prohibits commercial use of these designs in mass production; note, however that we encourage individuals to contract with fabrication service bureaus for the creation of personal copies. For more information, see our license and disclaimers, below.

Implementation

The Free Universal Construction Kit comprises nearly 80 two-way adapters. These allow each of the different construction toys (Lego, Tinkertoy, Fischertechnik etc.) to interface with any of the other supported systems. Prior to modeling, the dimensions of the various toy connectors were reverse-engineered with an optical comparator fitted with a digital read-out accurate to less than one ten-thousandth of an inch (0.0001in., or 2.54 microns).

Figure 3. A Bristle Block being measured in the optical comparator.

The resulting precision ensures that the Free Universal Construction Kit â€œactually worksâ€, enabling tight snap-fits between custom and commercial components.

Figure 4. The Kit in use, connecting four different systems together.

Below is a partial gallery of assorted Kit adapters, respectively compatible with (clockwise from top left): Lego, Zoob, Tinkertoys, and Gears! Gears! Gears!. Click on the images for higher-resolution photographs:




Figs. 5-8. Select adapters from the Free Universal Construction Kit.

In addition to its many one-to-one adapters, the Free Universal Construction Kit also includes a special fist-sized Universal Adapter Brick which provides connectivity between all of the supported construction systems:

Fig. 9. The Universal Adapter Brick.

Producing physical prints from our provided 3D models prompts certain fabrication considerations. According to Wikipedia, the precision of Lego pieces is less than 10 microns. As of early 2012, however, standard Makerbot printers have an XY resolution of 100 microns (0.1mm) and a default layer thickness of 360 microns (0.36mm). We thus caution that fabrication of the Free Universal Construction Kit with current (2012-era) solutions for DIY 3D printing, such as the Makerbot, Printrbot or RepRap, may lack the precision required for reliable or satisfactory coupling with standard commercial pieces. A great deal depends on how well-tuned the printer is; thus, your mileage may vary. In any case, we expect this situation will improve gradually, but inexorably, in tandem with improvements to these vibrantly evolving fabrication platforms. The artistâ€™s proof shown here was created in a UV-cured white resin using a commercial-grade Objet (â€œpolyjetâ€) 3D printer, which has a horizontal resolution of 42 microns, and a layer thickness of 16 microns. Ponoko.com and other private fabrication services offer printing from Objet machines and other high-resolution devices.

Legal and Commercial Implications

Consider the frustrating experience of purchasing a new computer (a Mac, say) and discovering that it will not play your auntâ€™s Windows Media video of your little cousins. Likewise, imagine your auntâ€™s corresponding annoyance when she finds that her PC will not play the Apple Quicktime video you sent her of your cats. This humiliating little episode isnâ€™t an accident; itâ€™s just a skirmish in a never-ending battle between giant commercial entities, played out, thousands of times every day, in exactly such micro-punishments to customers like you. If youâ€™re well-informed, you may happen to know about VLC â€” a free, open-source video player, developed by independent hackers as a grassroots remedy for exactly this problem. Until the advent of ubiquitous 3D printing, software remedies like VLC werenâ€™t readily available for hardware products, like toys. Thatâ€™s changing.

Todayâ€™s manufacturers have little or no intrinsic motivation to make their products compatible with anyone elseâ€™s. Indeedâ€”despite obvious benefits to users everywhereâ€”the implementation of cross-brand interoperability can be nearly impossible, given the tangled restrictions of patents, design rights, and trademarks involved in doing so. So we stepped up. The Free Universal Construction Kit is the VLC of childrenâ€™s playsets.

As we can see from the example above, interoperability is a question of power and market dominance. Most market leaders regard interoperability as an anti-competitive nuisance, a regulatory check on their ambition, or a concession to the whining of lesser players. Quite simply, interoperability is the request of the disenfranchised. And which end-user, in so many ways, is less enfranchised than a preliterate child?

The simple fact is that no toy company would ever make the Free Universal Construction Kit. Instead, each construction toy wants (and indeed, pretends) to be your only playset. Within this worldview, the other manufacturersâ€™ construction sets are just so many elephants in the room, competing for your attention on the shelves of Toys-R-Us. No longer. The Free Universal Construction Kit presents what no manufacturer could: a remedy providing extensible, post-facto syntactic interoperability for construction toys. Let the fun begin!

Some may express concern that the Free Universal Construction Kit infringes such corporate prerogatives as copyright, design right, trade dress, trademarks or patents of the supported toy systems. We encourage those eager to enforce these rights to please think of the children (or perhaps the Streisand effect) â€” and we assert that the home printing of the Free Universal Construction Kit constitutes protected fair use. Simon Bradshaw et al., writing in â€œThe Intellectual Property Implications of Low-Cost 3D Printingâ€, conclude that the public is legally allowed to make 3D prints that mate with proprietary parts, especially in cases (the â€œMust Fit Exceptionâ€) where a pieceâ€™s shape â€œis determined by the need to connect to or fit into or around another productâ€:

â€œ__Even where a registered design is copied via a 3D printer this would not be an infringement if it were done ‘privately and for purposes which are not commercial’. Both criteria must be met; it is insufficient that copying is not done for profit. Purely personal use of a 3D printer to make items will thus not infringe a registered design.â€

*In fact, the Free Universal Construction Kit deliberately avoids patent infringement. Part of our strategy for doing so is our choice to support older (â€œclassicâ€) playsets: of the ten toy systems supported by the Kit, eight are no longer protected by active (20-year) patents. To take a few examples: Lego was patented in 1958; Lincoln Logs, in 1920; and Tinkertoys, in 1932. There are, however, two instances in which toy systems nominally supported by the Kit are still protected (as of this writing) by active patents: Zoob (patented 1996) and ZomeTool (patented 2002). For the Zoob and Zome systems, please note that we have delayed the release of pertinent adapter models until December 2016 and November 2022, respectively.

The Free Universal Construction Kit is simply one â€œtoyâ€ illustration of a coming grassroots revolution, in which everyday people canâ€”with desktop toolsâ€”overcome arbitrary restrictions in mass-manufactured physical culture. The burgeoning possibility of freely shared downloadable adapters has significant implications for industries where the attempt to create â€œtechnological lock-inâ€ is a common business practice. For more on this subject, and the legal horizons of reproducing commercial products with home fabrication systems, please see:

Bradshaw, Simon; A. Bowyer and P. Haufe, â€œThe Intellectual Property Implications of Low-Cost 3D Printingâ€, 7:1 SCRIPTed 5, 2010.
de Bruijn, Erik. â€œFab It Yourself: Adapters & Consumer Lock-Inâ€. Blog.erikdebruijn.nl, 13 September 2010.
Hanna, Peter. â€œThe next Napster? Copyright questions as 3D printing comes of ageâ€. Arstechnica.com, April 2011.
Ross, Valerie. â€œCan You Patent a Shape? 3D Printing on Collision Course With Intellectual Property Lawâ€. Discover Magazine, 7 April 2011.
Weinberg, Michael. â€œ3D Printing Settlers of Catan is Probably Not Illegal: Is This a Problem?â€. PublicKnowledge.org, 28 January 2011.
Weinberg, Michael. â€œIt Will Be Awesome if They Donâ€™t Screw it Up: 3D Printing, Intellectual Property, and the Fight Over the Next Great Disruptive Technologyâ€. PublicKnowledge.org, 10 November 2010.

In addition to the writers above, we tip our hats to Thingiverse user Zydac, whose related project (a Duplo-to-Brio track adapter) led us to these legal writings; to Andrew Plumb (Clothbot) who has probed the legal and practical implications of Lego-compatible bricks for some time; and to Daan van den Berg, who has explored 3D-printed remixes of branded forms as a mode of critical artistic practice.

License and Disclaimers

The Free Universal Construction Kit and its associated media are licensed under and subject to the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike 3.0 Unported License (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-sa/3.0/legalcode). The official URL for the Free Universal Construction Kit is https://fffff.at/free-universal-construction-kit. You are free to copy, distribute and transmit the Kit, and to remix and/or adapt the Kit; in doing so, you must attribute the Kit to â€œF.A.T. Lab and Sy-Labâ€, and include a link to the project using the URL above. We especially welcome extensions to the Kit which provide compatibility with as-yet-unsupported play systems. Please note that extensions to the Kit require the same or similar license. You may not use the Kit in commercial mass production; however, we permit individuals to contract with fabrication service bureaus (e.g. Ponoko, Shapeways, etc.) for personal copies.

LegoÂ®, DuploÂ®, FischertechnikÂ®, Gears! Gears! Gears!Â®, Kâ€™NexÂ®, KrinklesÂ®, Bristle BlocksÂ®, Lincoln LogsÂ®, TinkertoysÂ®, ZomeÂ®, ZomeToolÂ® and ZoobÂ® are trademarks of their respective owners. The Free Universal Construction Kit is not associated or affiliated with, or endorsed, sponsored, certified or approved by, any of the foregoing owners or their respective products.

We are not a commercial company; we are artists, hackers and activists. The Kit is not a product; it is a provocation. F.A.T. Lab and Sy-Lab, in cooperation with Adapterz LLC, (1) perform solely the service of publishing the Free Universal Construction Kit, (2) do not participate in any production, public manufacture or sale of the items displayed here, and (3) offer no opinion, warranty or representation as to the safety, quality or functionality of the Kit. The F.A.T. Lab, Sy-Lab and Adapterz LLC therefore offer no warranty of any kind, express or implied.

Please cite the Free Universal Construction Kit, and/or this article, as follows:

Free Art and Technology [F.A.T.] Lab and Sy-Lab. â€œThe Free Universal Construction Kit.â€ Fffff.at, 20 March 2012. <https://fffff.at/free-universal-construction-kit>.

WARNING: CHOKING HAZARD!
Small parts. Not for children under 3 years.

Credits, Contact and Acknowledgements

For press or other inquiries about the Free Universal Construction Kit, please contact info@adapterz.org. The Kit was conceived and developed by the F.A.T. (Free Art and Technology) Lab in collaboration with Sy-Lab, and is represented, for legal purposes, by Adapterz, LLC. The Kit’s “advertisement” video was created by Riley Harmon.

The creators express gratitude to: our families; our lawyers; the children appearing in our demonstration video, and their families; Jean Aw, Eric Brockmeyer, David Familian, Andy Flowers, Michael Joaquin Grey, Mark Gross, Riley Harmon, Marcie and Lawrence Hayhurst, Allie Oswell, Eric Paulos, Bre Pettis, Kent Sheely, Michael Weinberg, and the STUDIO for Creative Inquiry. The Kit files are sportingly hosted by Thingiverse.com.

Keywords

Toys, kits, constructions sets, construction toys, construction systems, Lego, Duplo, Fischertechnik, Gears! Gears! Gears!, Kâ€™Nex, Krinkles, Bristle Blocks, Lincoln Logs, Tinkertoys, Zome, ZomeTool, Zoob, Constructivist learning, play, connectors, adaptors, adapter piece, adapter brick, adapters, universal translator, gender changer, modularity, interoperability, interoperability remedy, compatibility layer, technological lock-in, post-facto plug-and-play syntactic interoperability, shim, computer aided design, 3D models, STL files, physibles, rapid prototyping, 3D printing, Makerbot, RepRap, Printrbot, Thingiverse, Ponoko, F.A.T. Lab, Sy-Lab, fair use, remix, hybrid, mashup.

The commons and the public good are continually threatened by narrow interests seeking private gain. Please continue to support and protect the free, open, and non-proprietary exchange and development of ideas and information online.

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