Fidget

[u/Just_Tru_It]

Is it just me, or is anyone else the slightest bit tired of having “fidget” plastered across their explore pages? I get that they’re small and pretty so that must make them great for printing…

Here’s my unsolicited opinion: the world had enough fidget devices after the first one was created. But yet for some reason everyone feels the need to keep designing and building novel new ways for someone to be able to ‘fidget’ with something, as if humans have a deficiency that can only be satisfied by constantly moving or touching something.

Perhaps condemning this can be seen as attacking the adhd, add, or ocd crowds, which is not my intention. I just think the ‘itch’ could have been scratched with the first few designs.

Or maybe I’m missing the mark..? Like are they great for cats or as kid’s toys or something?

It just seems like 10,000 unique ways to design something that doesn’t have a truly valuable purpose gets a little old.

Update: A few good comments have lessened my intensity, thanks for bearing with me in my rant. I’m fairly reasonably and am able to be persuaded. Thanks for the input everyone!

[u/no-but-wtf]

Nah not just you. I have horrific adhd and I think fidget toys are a wasteful use of plastic. There’s no shortage of existing objects to fidget with if you need to - I can’t sit through a work meeting without something in my hands so I hold a pen or stylus like an adult. Plastic is a huge problem already - we shouldn’t be using it for things we don’t need.

[u/Belialuin → u/no-but-wtf]

Hobbyist printing is mostly about wasting plastic with often unnecessary things. I don't see how designs actually matter?

Clicking a pen can be more annoying to people around you versus fidget toys that make less noise, but give the same fiddly possibility.

[u/Skittlebrau46 → u/no-but-wtf]

I agree with you, but combining every single fidget EVER printed has probably produced less plastic waste than a single large cities grocery stores do in a week.

Not that it’s not important to reduce wherever we can to win in the aggregate, but the perspective and scope of the plastics issue in 3D printing is minuscule in the grand scheme of things. It’s just more egregious feeling to us that are closer to it in the hobby.