FIRST Choice is Profoundly Flawed
 

FIRST Choice has served and continues to serves my team very poorly. We have never gotten anything particularly useful from the FIRST Choice program (FC). For the last 4 weeks there certainly has been little available that we can use on the designs for the current season. That is because the things that we could use to actually compete with are provided in such small numbers that we can’t get them. So now we have 100 FC points that are essentially worthless.
The bottom line is we now need to stop worrying about what we need for a given year’s competition and choose the most valuable/scarcest items. We have to indulge in bad engineering, bad sportsmanship, bad logistics just to compete. Not gracious/not professional.
FIRST needs to design a system that makes more sense or redesign the FC system. They could set up a rotation system wherein the choice of the high value targets is limited over time or some other such concept.

(I personally would be less offended if the program was killed and we just had to buy those items. At least it would be an honest system. I would be happy to contribute ideas or time to solving it. It has already occupied too much of my time.)

Re: FIRST Choice is Profoundly Flawed
 

You're not alone, this has been discussed at length here (and here, and others).

It's a tricky problem to solve. I thank the folks at AndyMark for their dedication this season.

Re: FIRST Choice is Profoundly Flawed
 

FIRSTChoice first opened back in December. It's a first-come-first-serve program. This is well-documented and well-advertised. Why did you wait until mid-January to start looking for parts? Are you shopping for Christmas trees now too?
I'm trying, but I just don't see how you get from the first sentence to the second. Why would you order parts you won't need/won't use?
They already do exactly this. Some of the parts were available in December; other parts were rotated in after kickoff.
What's stopping you, or any other team, from purchasing what you need? Most everything on FIRSTChoice is available to the public.

I agree with Glenn, there are flaws with the program if it is viewed as a KoP program. But that's not what it really is. FIRSTChoice is a way for companies to support teams by giving away free stuff, but these companies have neither the inventory nor the inclination to donate to each team. So when the parts run out, it's kind of by design.

Re: FIRST Choice is Profoundly Flawed
 

There is some merit to what is being said in this post. I'm trying to understand it for what its worth minus your frustrations. We've had some of the same issues as well.

It reminds me of Black Friday when retailers spend millions on ads to advertise doorbuster sales, but essentially impossible to get without camping out for days prior.

On the other hand, the system is a big improvement compared to before, where we had items we never used year and year that went to waste.

Re: FIRST Choice is Profoundly Flawed
 

The idea of seeing items in December was a great one, including being able to order prior to build season.
Unfortunately, without knowing the game and/or actually building your robot, do you determine what you actually need.

If you asked me in December, how much cylinders, plumbing, motor controllers, etc. that I needed, I couldnt tell you.

Re: FIRST Choice is Profoundly Flawed
 

I'm a big fan of FIRST choice but there are a few things I think that could've be improved with the system:

1.) Credits carrying the same value: The credit system needs work. For example a piece of surgical tubing is 6 credits, but a Dewalt drill is 7 credits.

2.) Cap in quantity. There was no cap (with exception of the Frisbees) to my knowledge on the amount of each item you could request. So a team could walk away with 12 drills. Not saying teams bought more than needed and sold them on ebay etc but it gives the opportunity to people.

3.) More inventory of big items. I'm not sure how many drills, talons etc were originally available but we signed in minutes after it opened up and all the "good" stuff was gone.

4.) Rookies getting an early sale. We are mentoring 4714 and they would've benefited greatly from alot of parts on here that went so fast. If rookies were given an early slot to get the parts they need desperately to compete with veterans, then I think rookie performance would be increased.

Again, can't say enough how much I LOVE the FIRST Choice system. But these are a few of the ways I think they could be improved.

I'd recommend ordering the minute it opens up and order pieces you KNOW you are going to use. My team opted for Frisbees, motors, and pneumatic components. All stuff we knew we needed this year or stuff we will for sure need in the off season.

Re: FIRST Choice is Profoundly Flawed
 

The credit-to-dollar ratio among parts available on FIRSTChoice is wildly different for each part. Some parts, such as Talons, represent a fantastic value compared to other parts and, simultaneously, have many, many more use cases than those other parts. That means that they disappear immediately and use of FIRSTChoice -- even if you sign in right away on the day it opens -- is an exercise in frustration and furious button mashing. It's the online version of Walmart on Black Friday and somewhat ridiculous.

We have money and buy all of the parts we want or need and are very fortunate to be able to do that. That means that I don't have to worry about practicing loading items into my cart, blocking out time in the middle of my work day so I can be online at 12:00:00 and fighting with bugs, server time outs, etc. Not everyone is as lucky.

Re: FIRST Choice is Profoundly Flawed
 

My biggest complaint with First Choice is with the inventory and point pricing system. The points seem way out of proportion to the value of the part (e.x. Right angle drill is less points than a roll of pneumatic tubing.) It seems to encourage people taking the higher value items even if there is not a strong need for it. Our team could have definitely used some of the out of stock items like a new classmate. Unfortunately we did not get on FC until the 1st week (which is only our own fault.)

I really hope they redo the point pricing for next year.

Other than that I'm okay with the concept of FC. (We have enough brass fittings...)

Re: FIRST Choice is Profoundly Flawed
 

I think fixing the point system would prevent a need for caps on most items unless they had low quantities to begin with.

I definitely agree with that, a lot of the parts veterans have collected over the years.

Re: FIRST Choice is Profoundly Flawed
 

Couldn't agree more. First choice isn't quite working out as they had planned. In reality, the KOP has been cut down to near nothing and the registration fee remains the same.

Re: FIRST Choice is Profoundly Flawed
 

Wow...Taylor. You have not read what I wrote carefully and chosen to speak in a profoundly disrespectful manner.

Re: FIRST Choice is Profoundly Flawed
 

I do think FC could work but needs work itself. I guess I should have stated that for us it is not economic hardship. We have been very lucky to substantial community support. We can buy what we want. It is the frustration with the dysfunction of the system that I am trying to address.

Re: FIRST Choice is Profoundly Flawed
 

One issue is the rookie teams are not going to know in Dec that they are going to need a compressor, camera, so on, and know that they only have a day or so to order. Maybe that stuff should be put back in the rookie kits even at the expense of not having them on First Choice.

Re: FIRST Choice is Profoundly Flawed
 

I was thinking the same thing! Some teams need to realize that money IS a BIG factor for other teams.

Re: FIRST Choice is Profoundly Flawed
 

The more important line in Taylor's response is one you seem to have conveniently ignored.

Now, I happen to agree that FC is flawed. But it's a step in the right direction from the gross waste of the past 2 decades. It needs some work. But, the fact is I have several thousand dollars worth of stuff from the last 16 KOP that will probably never be used by us. I wish it could have gone to teams that needed it rather than sit and take up storage space but the fact is cataloging and distributing it is not cost effective at this point in time for us.

Am I defending the fact that FC doesn't seem to benefit the very teams that need the resources most? No. But I will say that waiting until 2 months after a store declares open season on their stock and then complaining there is nothing left that's edible is just plain silly.



And I'm going to address the fact that money is a big factor. If you are planning on building a robot on just your KoP money grant you are doing it wrong. FIRST is not simply something we do 6 weeks out of the year. Fundraising and outreach are a year round thing. You see teams with these big corporate sponsors and lots of machining ability and we are all jealous. But you know what? They weren't just handed that. I suggest pinging Adam Heard, I know he and 973 worked their rear ends off for everything they have and it might be a good lesson in hard work paying dividends.

Re: FIRST Choice is Profoundly Flawed
 

A hundred times this. At least use the already existing threads if you want to voice your concerns. Don't teams have other things they should be doing right now other than complaining on here about FIRST Choice? Taylor wasn't being rude, he was asking a legitimate question.

Re: FIRST Choice is Profoundly Flawed
 

I see you share Taylors same affliction, Mr. Schreiber...the casual rudeness and cruelty that is the right and of every Internet denizen. Thank you for giving your reply context early.

The reason I didn't address his flip and loutish remark was because what I said was that I still had 100 points left. I saw no point in addressing a flawed set assumptions based on a careless reading. But to clarify, since explicit would seem to be required for some.

I spent the first set of points immediately and still couldn't get a lot of what we would have preferred. As for the second set, between technical issues and personal obligations I was not able to get back FC till 24 hours after the inital opening. It seems a reasonable amount time to me even now. After that 24 hours there was nothing left except what which would at best be only vaguely useful.

You state that you see FC as flawed as well but you focus not on solutions but rather on correcting me for errors based on hastily drawn conclusions and imagined character flaws. Not helpful, sir.

Re: FIRST Choice is Profoundly Flawed
 

I don't think it is that flawed.. What is flawed is many folks understanding of what FIRST Choice really is... I so much enjoy a kickoff without the crate of stuff we won't use. I know this is an issue for more veteran teams, but I still have buckets of old drill motors (and cases), FP transmissions, etc... I am glad that I don't receive this anymore and that stuff like it end up on FC for another team to use.

I did appreciate the FC items we picked up this year... the new right angle drill, multimeter, extra C-Rio, compressor, etc... I thought it worked pretty well. Anyone want to exchange 14 plastic FP transmissions for ... well... anything?

Re: FIRST Choice is Profoundly Flawed
 

To be fair, there's no practical difference between ordering two months in and ordering at 12:30pm on opening day. The most useful items, like batteries, Crios, classmates, speed controllers etc. are all gone by then. You're left with a lot of items that aren't very useful and just as expensive in terms of points.

FIRST choice serves teams who have good network luck and someone with nothing else to do in the middle of the day. It's not even really First come/first serve, it's first to not experience a network error/first serve.

There are a lot of things FIRST could do to change the situation. I hope they do any one of them, because it'd be an improvement.

Re: FIRST Choice is Profoundly Flawed
 

I appreciate the feedback. We too receive lots of stuff we don't need. I am not sure what the fix for that is. Unfortunately, much of what is moved to FC is exactly the stuff I would want year in and year out. I am always going to need controllers and so on.

Re: FIRST Choice is Profoundly Flawed
 

http://www.chiefdelphi.com/forums/sh....php?p=1200883 I did focus on solutions. 2 months ago. When this system came out. Sadly due to the sheer amount of time I give to this program I have been unable to run a simulation of FIRST Choice using different algorithms for distribution. It's on my todo list though, I'll probably not get to it until after I bag my robot.

If you want to talk about FC being broken and unfair...

Did you know that if you had a team number under 1000 you couldn't log in for the first 30 minutes? At which point a good chunk of things were ALREADY gone. You'll take note that I mentor a team that happens to have 2 digits. Perhaps you weren't the only one negatively impacted by this system. But unlike you, who appears to be merely want a sounding board for your negativity, many of us spent a good chunk of time trying to figure out possible solutions for next year.

Here's a suggestion, sitting here griping about stuff and lambasting a system without offering solutions is not productive. And outright insulting people who agree with you on the majority of your comments is far more foolish than I'd expect out of someone who has been around this program for a few years. Let's take a breath and focus on solutions. Anger and insults never solved any problem.

Re: FIRST Choice is Profoundly Flawed
 

I think your missing something about FC, all the items are donated free of charge to FIRST they don't chose to "move" these items here they place the donated items here. And only the quantities that are donated. In the past if a company was only able to donate 100 of an item FIRST wouldn't be able to pass it on to teams because they couldn't donate enough for even every rookie team to get one.

I agree there are flaws but I'd rather have the option for some free stuff even if it seems worthless, you never know when you'll need that left handed screw driver, than the other option of FIRST turning it away.
Bottom line this stuff is donated for free. I'll take whatever I can get.

Re: FIRST Choice is Profoundly Flawed
 

Again, you should go look at what I actually said and examine your assumptions.

Re: FIRST Choice is Profoundly Flawed
 

I think some argument is starting to be bred out of how things are being said, something that tends to derail good discussion and exchange of ideas. The topic of the thread is to discuss FIRST Choice and the flaws it currently holds. Let's try not to tear apart each other's arguments, okay? *steps off soap box*

FIRST Choice may or may not be flawed depending on how you view it as a whole. I, personally, view FC as a bonus. Not something teams are entitled to, or something that should be distributed to teams in need, but a bonus to stack on the work teams have already done for fundraising. Yes, it does provide a lovely benefit to low-resource teams so they can focus their funding on other essential parts. But at the end of the day, low resource teams existed before FIRST Choice, and, if FIRST Choice ever ends, they will exist after. It's like... Um. It's not really frosting on the cake. But it's like, getting a piece of cake with frosting, and FIRST Choice is the sprinkles. So, because I view FIRST Choice like this, I don't find the system to be flawed at all. It's first come, first serve. It doesn't really get much more fair than that, to me. The items are all donated items. And FIRST is making use of those donated items by giving teams a chance to grab them.

I definitely see how some focus on the benefit it provides to rookie and other lower resource teams. I'm not really smart enough to come up with a system that treats all the teams fairly, so I can't provide too much discussion for how we resolve this. But it does seem a bit unfair that these donated items are going to teams who are less in need. But in the end, every team has the same chance to get them. It's not like veterans got a special password to access FC early. I'm not much of a shopper, so the concept of people camping, waiting for FC to open is a little over my head. But it ended up being a race, and people got what they could. There's not much else I can say. If a team missed out because they couldn't get there in time, I can't say I find it unfair. But I would if I was focused on FC being more important as a boost for low resource teams.

I can only find two things FIRST can do to make FC more fair. They either raise their stock, or lower the points each team is given. And since FIRST can't control the stock of donated items, adjusting prices and lowering the amount of points given seems to be the most logical course of action, at least in my eyes.

Re: FIRST Choice is Profoundly Flawed
 

In December, the useful items were gone within hours. By Jan 5th, most items were gone. It's not like we are trying to order now. I agree on the FP transmissions and all the other items not used in the past, but lets be honest.....the KOP is pretty sad. With the FC the way it is, many teams simply have to pony up extra money or do without. OR take off work, sit at a computer at a certain time in December and take a guess at what they will be needing for the next season. One other thing folks, many speak of all the items being "donated", and they are, but they were also donated back when we received two crates and a couple of boxes in the KOP. It's not like they started the FC because items were being donated. I spoke with AndyMark about FC and got the same answer...."only so much was donated and when it's gone, it's gone". My problem is when teams post pictures of obtaining 12 or 15 of a certain item that is now "gone" and my team needs only one.....we have to buy it. Did they really need 15 of that specific item.....probably not.......

Re: FIRST Choice is Profoundly Flawed
 

I cannot, personally, remember ever seeing a picture like this. Care to provide a link?

Re: FIRST Choice is Profoundly Flawed
 

Gladly! BTW....my mistake...they received 18 TALONS!

http://www.chiefdelphi.com/forums/sh...28#post1211528

Re: FIRST Choice is Profoundly Flawed
 

That is showing two teams worth of components.

Re: FIRST Choice is Profoundly Flawed
 

If you will note from the linked posts in that thread, those Talons are shared between 2 teams. 9 speed controllers to a team is actually quite reasonable in any given year: 4 on drive, 3 for other motors that require variable speed, and 2 spares/extra motors because the Talons are at this point beta tested but haven't exactly gone through a full FRC season with lots of them out there. This year, that might even translate to 6 on drive, 2 for climbing, 1 spare/shooter.

Re: FIRST Choice is Profoundly Flawed
 

You clearly can't tell the difference with someone not sharing your opinions and someone being rude to you. Both Taylor's and Andrew's responses were reasonable and constructive. Maybe if you spent less time trying to make someone else the "bad guy," being rude in the process, and actually addressing the issue at hand as opposed to getting into petty arguments that you couldn't possibly ever win, you might receive more sympathy and ideas to the problem you posted.

Re: FIRST Choice is Profoundly Flawed
 

Put in my two cents or avoid beating the dead horse... putting in my two cents wins.

First off, maybe I missed the posts about it, but the first I heard that our pneumatic components would have to come from FC was kickoff. Had I known back in December, we might have ordered differently.

Second, as a student team member who has witnessed the growth of FC, I think this year's use of the system is against the spirit of FIRST. Until this year, FC struck me as a nice way to add a few minor parts/tools (the 2011 system was easy to understand and functional). But this year, it became a race to see who could win big and who would end up with the leftover couplings. The teams who won big see no problem with the system that's given them 9 Talons (each of Clarkson's teams) or 2 Classmates or a new cRIO or compressor (or some combination of the lot). And indeed, even if I got one of those items out of FC, I wouldn't be so disillusioned by the system.

FIRST is supposed to be for the student team members. No ifs, ands, or buts about it. How many threads have we seen complaining about robots that were clearly built by the mentors? The students should be the ones designing, building, and testing a robot (IMHO), and this includes selecting parts to go into a robot/team. And yet here we have a system that forces the mentors to do the selection and ordering of parts in a crazy race-for-the-computer during the day while many of them are working (for the first round, at least). By the time our school day ended and we were able to gather the team's student leadership to complete the order with our mentor, a mere three hours after FC opened, all of the parts we desired most were gone - compressor, battery, cRIO, classmate, even the multimeter (if I remember correctly). We ended up with a decent haul including a few window motors, some tools we've put to good use this build season, and a battery mount we won't use in this year's design, but the fact remains that we're still using a compressor, cRIO, and Classmate that have been with the team at least as long as I have (pretty sure the first year of the Classmate was my first year also) and running on three working batteries.
It's not that we can't work around this (our cRIO still works fine, even after a few coatings of sawdust from our old digs, our programmer brings his laptop for us to work off, and we could in theory order more batteries), it would just be better to know that these items were going to the teams that needed them the most or at least in a more even distribution.

And for the second cycle of FIRST Choice, the entirety of my team's leadership was on a bus headed home from kickoff. Even less useful stuff was available by the time we were able to get to a computer, which led to us ordering useless items to use up our credits as we'd be paying for the shipping anyway.

I'm in favor of the draft system, and I know a few programmers who might be up for writing it. There needs to be some way to bring more balance to FIRST Choice.

Re: FIRST Choice is Profoundly Flawed
 

I would agree that there are may things that I would prefer to see in the KOP, at least for rookies. There is a noticeable lack of pneumatics in the rookie KOP, which if your team didn't realize you need early in the season, you have to buy everything to get that subsystem working yourself.

Re: FIRST Choice is Profoundly Flawed
 

Is FIRST Choice perfect? No. Is FIRST Choice flawed? potentially. What are we accomplishing by sitting here arguing over it? I'm sure AndyMark and FIRST would LOVE to hear feedback on the system, specifically suggestions on how to improve it! We can have constructive discussion here, but let's not turn this into a thread bashing the neat concept that is FIRST Choice.

Re: FIRST Choice is Profoundly Flawed
 

I think it's flawed a bit. The idea is nice, but for example, replacing motor controllers with electrical tape in the KOP because the motor controllers are now avaliable in First Choice is just silly. We logged in one day late, and all the motor controllers, batterys, cRIO's etc were all gone.
First choice should really be limited in how many items a team can stock up, as well as more of an addition to the kit rather then a main part of it. it isn't fun to rush and overload servers and hope you ordered something in time...

Re: FIRST Choice is Profoundly Flawed
 

I think an awful lot of issues would be solved by imposing per-item quantity limits and/or fixing the credit prices. There's no reason a $200 camera and $400 laptop combined should cost less credits than 2 $30 joysticks, nor should a $5 coupling cost the same as aforementioned $200 camera.

I happen to prefer the second solution because it solves both problems in one go.

Re: FIRST Choice is Profoundly Flawed
 

Exactly, and for items with low quantities they might look to try a lottery system where everyone can have a window to put in points for it if they want that particular item.

Re: FIRST Choice is Profoundly Flawed
 

I want to go on the record as voicing my disappointment with FIRST Choice. I was on soon after it opened and everything we could use was gone. We were looking at Talons, a CRIO, and sensors. By the time I was able to get on (within hours) everything was gone. Nothing else was really worth the shipping to us. This is the second year that I have left ALL of the FIRST Choice points intact. I am thinking that more teams need to just leave the points instead of ordering useless stuff to burn up the points. I think if FRC sees many teams leaving all 100 points it might trigger some discussion that the system isn't working for quite a few teams.

My thought is that there should be a first round where teams get 1 or 2 of things that would be reasonably expected to be needed by all teams. After that initial round teams could have a free for all over what is left.

I agree that there were many items in the kit that were not needed. However, the pendulum seems to be swung the other way. The kit of parts was pretty bare this year. I realize that we are collectively renting many large spaces in urban areas for regionals but the cost is getting a bit much for what you get. Especially knowing that the same $5k would support almost 7 lego teams or several FTC teams. Yes I am aware that the cost has not gone up in many years. Add on to that the several thousand you know you are going to need because the kit is so lean. My understanding was that the KoP was supposed to provide a team a reasonably competitive robot. I was beaten up on this very forum for suggesting otherwise and regaled with stories of teams winning regionals on nothing more than the KoP and a good hammer. I don't think you could put a robot on the field this year out of the kit. In our case, as a team that is now in our 5th season, we needed to replace the camera (ours quite working), the classmate is about worthless, and we are on the old CRio that could use replacing. A well thought out and better FIRST Choice would go a long way toward solving some of the problems. If nothing else, maybe an auction of some type for the FIRST Choice major parts?

Re: FIRST Choice is Profoundly Flawed
 

I see your point and I wholeheartedly agree that the robots should be student built and student designed. After all, what is the point of FIRST if we are taking the mentors who presumably already know what they are doing and let them have free reign with everything. That being said, there really is not a way that I can think of to change the system and I believe that it should stay the way that it is, the spirit of FIRST is not winning, it is learning.

Secondly, our team has the same problems as yours but to solve it we show the FC page to all student subteam leaders before the order day. Then with their subteams they pick out items that they might want and put them in a spreadsheet. We review eachother's choices to make sure that multiple teams are not requesting the same item, and if they are we place it higher on the list. Then the finalized list is given to the head mentor who places the order basically as soon as FC opens.

It is by no means perfect, but I think that we do a good job of maximizing student involvement while not sacrificing too much from FC. I agree that the points pricing needs reconsideration and there should be a limit on the maximum quantity of items (like talons). No offense to 4124 and 229, I applaud your use of the system and how well you work together.


Please check out ANY of our team's robots, you will quickly see that they are student built. You could hear the gears of last years shooter over the CMP webcast :ahh:

Re: FIRST Choice is Profoundly Flawed
 

Let's please not turn a thread about FIRST Choice into a debate about Student Built/Mentor Built robots. We already have multiple discussions about that elsewhere.

FIRST Choice is not a perfect system. The best way to improve the system would probably be to adjust the points system. We can all agree that FIRST Choice needs to be balanced, to be more "fair"; however arguing with one another about just how "fair" it is right now is not the way to fix it. Instead of arguing; how about we remember that the people behind the screens are in fact people, with feelings, trying to do what they believe is best for the program. Instead of fighting with one another; let's try to come up with an agreeable fix to the system, and send it to FIRST HQ or AndyMark.

Re: FIRST Choice is Profoundly Flawed
 

FIRST has specifically stated that robots built by mentors, or more specifically with mentor involvement, are OK. Also, FIRST is about Inspiration and Recognition. The vehicle they use is a robot competition--FIRST is NOT a robot competition.

@zzzag: I point you to the mission statement at http://www.usfirst.org/aboutus/vision and ask you to show me one piece of FIRST literature, web-based or in print, that says that FIRST is all about the students.

I could go off into a rant about what I see as the real motive behind the "mentor-built robots" threads, but that would serve no purpose. Instead, I am going to suggest that a mod split off the posts and portions of posts beating the glue-that-was-a-horse for separate discussion, and return to discussion of how to make FC better.



If I was to make FC better, I'd start by seeing if I could get more of high-value items. Higher supply means more teams can get more of those items. Second, I'd see what didn't distribute well the previous year--that stuff would go down to really cheap, really quickly.

Then I'd start tackling the real problems. Price point, computer bugs, large orders, small credits. I'd actually start out by not changing the limits on quantity able to be bought, but credits available per round and number of rounds. Instead of having 100 points per round and 2 rounds, I'd make it so that only 25 new points were available each round, and have 8 rounds, of short duration (3 days to a week, 6 before build and 2 after, or something like that). But, if you didn't use all your points in a given round, they'd carry over into the next round. Between rounds, update quantities and possibly do some new items (say, if I had Talons one round, I might have remaining Talons and some 888s available in the next round). The last round is open until CMP.

I'd also look at some resemblance of points to dollars as the baseline, followed by how many teams are likely to use something for a "fudge factor" to move the cost up or down. Talons go up a credit or so, snowblower motors down a credit, game pieces go way down but with a cap based on the number of FRC teams and the number of items (ideally, each team gets the same number if they want them).

Re: FIRST Choice is Profoundly Flawed
 

It is hard to inspire a student when they take THEIR creation and get stomped and embarrassed at a regional by a bot designed and built by mentors. It's sad to see students sitting on their bottoms in the pits while the "grown ups" work on the robot. I'm pretty sure that is not the intent of FIRST.

Re: FIRST Choice is Profoundly Flawed
 

Ugh... I swore I wouldn't get dragged into this.


You're wrong. Straight up wrong.

From Dave Lavery during the kickoff of the 2008 game.
(source http://robotics.arc.nasa.gov/events/...transcript.php)

There is a pretty recent thread on mentors and involment, that would be a great place to discuss mentors.

Lets keep this on First Choice.

Re: FIRST Choice is Profoundly Flawed
 

Then don't. ignore the trolls, they will always exist. If someone wants to see this discussion, they can use the search function or pm others. No dead horses allowed!

I personally think that FC does need to be modified. I would've loved to get a few motor controllers out of FC, instead of laying out $550 on enough motor controllers for our practice and competition bot. (plus our Demo bot. That's robots worth of controllers!). I'm in agreement with either a system to limit how many parts each team can get, or scaling point value with actual market cost.

Re: FIRST Choice is Profoundly Flawed
 

I'm pretty sure you're 100% wrong. Instead of being jealous of successful teams, develop and foster your own personal progress. I can't stand people that complain about "mentor built robots" that have NO CLUE about how successful teams operate. Want to be a top tier team? Work all year long. Develop a team that strives for perfection and settles for nothing but their personal best. If you do this, you have a chance at true inspiration. I encourage you to engage these so called "mentor built robot" teams, because you have no idea how they operate and accusing successful teams of not engaging students is terrible. Learn from the best and better your own team.

Re: FIRST Choice is Profoundly Flawed
 

Part of the problem with this discussion—and don't get me wrong, we need to be having this discussion—is that we don't really know why FIRST Choice is the way it is.

I think I've seen a couple of explanations of why it started, and all are probably partly right. But to add to those, I think it's a pretty reasonable conjecture that FIRST Choice was conceived to deal with insufficient supply of traditional KOP parts. By offering them up first-come, first-served, the appearance of equality could be maintained, without actually distributing equal quantities of KOP material.

There's nothing fundamentally unfair about that—after all, teams are being encouraged to react to limited supply by revealing their preferences in terms of what they select first and most frequently. That's how capitalism works. But that's also how market failure works (a concept that goes hand-in-hand with capitalism in the real world). Teams with insufficient information, motivation or capability to make a rational choice are at a disadvantage. In any market where pure rational decision-making cannot be presumed, there is likely to be a degree of market failure.

Contrast that with the commons (i.e. a thing composed of shared goods which need to be protected against overexploitation). Teams assuming FIRST Choice is part of the commons will naturally try to avoid hoarding, because they see intrinsic value in preserving supply for others. This is a nice thing to do, in theory, but feels really bad when others don't abide by the same precepts, and proceed to exploit it to the fullest extent. Why save for others if others are just going to be greedy? Also, how do you know how much you can rightfully take? To do that, you need to know something about the preferences of the other teams—but since there's no explicit communication, and no implicit signalling through market-based demand, it's easy to accidentally take too much or too little, even with good intentions.

I suppose FIRST could take a principled stand and say that the correct economic model is something for the teams to figure out on their own, by consensus. But since that's not going to advance their stated priorities very quickly (though it does have an upside), I'd much rather see them come down with some ground rules. Decide on some basic principles, and then let teams loose to do anything those rules permit.

If the rule is a free-for-all, then teams need to be ready, and FIRST needs to help them do so. If the rule is a commons, then teams need to discuss how to exploit it equitably and then play fair. If it's something else, then FIRST needs to describe it in terms that don't leave doubt about what's appropriate behaviour.


On another note, we need to have a discussion about whether the prices on FIRST Choice are intended to represent the cost to acquire the same item on the open market. I contend that that is a faulty assumption. While sometimes the prices might correspond, FIRST has enough deals with suppliers to be able regularly to offer things at non-market rates. FIRST could also be encouraging us to buy, by discounting some items.

Complaining that the an item is over- or under-valued on FIRST Choice implies a judgment of what the actual price should be. And you can't make that judgment unless you have a system for comparing FIRST Choice prices to those on the open market. So if you feel FIRST's valuation is wrong, you need to tell us why.