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"Home-based shopping will permit consumers to control manufacturing directly" - Services like Amazon have made a lot more available but the products are largely the same. The technology exists for far greater customization but the profit margin would be lower so no one has done it.

The technology to do that is 3D printing, but it's at a very early stage right now. I think they got this right in 1982 but underestimated how long it would take -- maybe because they didn't understand how much competitive manufacturing depends on scale and offshoring.



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