Commons-based peer production and digital fabrication: The case of a RepRap-based, Lego-built 3D printing-milling machine

• The conjunction of peer production with digital fabrication is discussed.
• We demonstrate the process of designing globally and manufacturing locally.
• We develop a RepRap-based, Lego-built 3D printing-milling machine.
• We show that modularity can catalyze peer production’s replication for tangibles.
• Light is shed on a possible trajectory of the current information-based paradigm.

Through the case of the RepRap-based, Lego-built three-dimensional (3D) printing-milling machine, this paper sets out to discuss and illustrate two points: First, on a theoretical level, that modularity, not only in terms of development process but also of hardware components, can catalyze Commons-based peer production’s (CBPP) replication for tangible products enabling social experimentation and learning. Second, the hybrid 3D printing-milling machine demonstrates the digitization of material and the potential of digital fabrication. We show how the synergy of a globally accessible knowledge Commons as well as of the CBPP practices with digital fabrication technologies, which are advancing and becoming more and more accessible, can arguably offer the ability to think globally and produce locally.