I can't say I've noticed advertisements on Printables, other than obviously having Prusa content on the main page. I run pihole so maybe that's blocking stuff. And I'm signed-in as a user in order to post my models, so don't get any nags about sign-up. I actually feel that Printables has been pretty open and approachable for non-Prusa users.

Will be interesting to see how Thingiverse evolves, looks like they have been making updates recently after years of neglect. With other vendors starting to push their own 3d model sites I think there is a risk the whole space could become fragmented, but on the other had having a just handful of dominant sites increases the risk of enshitification.

I'm seeing the same, A LOT more views and downloads on the models that I just copied across to Thingiverse in the last week.

Any particular reason why Thangs? I like the search, but I find the model management is not as intuitive

On Github/Gitlab - or a self hosted? Doesn't seem like to most discoverable way of hosting models, unless you're also linking to the git repo from one of the model sites. I do use git to version my OpenSCAD models, but just on a private selfhosted gitea instance.

I used PLA for this one as that's what I generally use. I've used PETG for a couple of items for outdoor use. Good point on it being less brittle.

Now that's an interesting idea - Lemmy3D, kbiniverse, FireFishables? Someone needs to start making this now!