What is Ponoko.com?

I just received an email about ponoko.com. What is it you ask? I had a hard time trying to figure that out myself at first, but after toiling through the site to find the FAQ, I found out that it is a very cool application/product. Ponoko is a laser cutting site that allows you to design something to be laser cut, whether it’s 2d art or a 3d piece of furniture. They have great starter templates that you can download and use in multiple different applications. Then, when your design is ready you have 3 options: You can ‘Browse & Buy’, ‘Make & Sell’, or ‘Mingle & Share’. The site About page says the following:

Ponoko is the world’s first personal manufacturing platform. It’s the online space for a community of creators and consumers to use a global network of digital manufacturing hardware to co-create, make and trade individualized product ideas on demand. The ponoko.com marketplace connects creators, consumers, digital manufacturing hardware and service providers to promote, make and trade products on Ponoko and social networking websites.

I’m not sure how much the printing and laser cutting will cost, but it’s a great idea. Let’s hope people use it.