Streamlined Events
 

You might want to check this out. FIRST is having some budget problems and it might affect your competition.


http://www.usfirst.org/robotics/stre...ventletter.htm

Wow, thats not good. At least they're just getting rid of the unimportant stuff for now, instead of raising registration fees or cutting teams.

i was against the party to begin with, but they can't get rid of the big screens, and the video feeds, those are really important to our teams strategy, and they look cool

Correct me if I'm wrong but this is only going to affect some regionals, the ones that will take on the title as streamlined, right? Well if it will only affect some regionals then I think they should just cut the team parties from all the regionals and keep the video feeds everywhere, because that is important not an extra socialization thing. I know that our team didn't stay for the team party in Seattle and those who went to it at LA said it was just decent. I know its supposed to be fun and all, but there are other ways for socialization that dont' require having to make cuts on other things.

I feel the same way. The three team parties I went to including the one at the Championship weren't what I was expecting them to be. So keep the screens and forget the parties. Or are we calling them "SOCIALS" now??

If I'm not mistaken, most of the regional sponsors are at the regional level. It would be kind of strange to take money from a company for regional A and send some of it over to regional B. That would be my guess as to why they don't do that.

True, but if everyone's gonna be paying the same price for a regional, then they should be getting the same ammenities. I mean, if the problem is company recognition at a specific regional, they could always give 1/2 to one and 1/2 to another and be given credit at both.

Anyone know if Johnson&Johnson are have money troubles? I hope not :) Rutgers rules. Although they can kill the team party...I'm a geek, I'm socially inept.

as fun as the "social" could be at the end of a hard competitive day i also agree that maybe the social should be done away with. i went to the nyc regional and fl national parties for my first time and they were not as fun as i thought it would be. yeah i managed to still have a good time but there was something missing from each party,

as for the big tv and video feeds they MUST stay. my team relies on these feed both on tv and the net to view how other teams play the new game b4 we actually go play it. basically watching these feeds give us an idea of how to play the game and how the rules are followed etc. so its quite helpful to the unexperienced team. besides i have bad eyes and must wear glasses. in order to see things i need to see BIG all the time everywhere i go or i will be one lost soul.


kinda what i already am now

Wasn't the profit of the 3 segways Dean sold suppose to go towards FIRST costs? Didn't each of the segways sell for over $100,000? That's a lot of money :confused:

yes but considiring the fact that each regional costs $250,000 that doesnt go too far.

My guess why they wouldn't send money from Regional A to regional B is quite simple: The sponsor that is sponsoring Reg A wants the money to stay where they are sponsoring it.

For example: OPG is a huge sponsor at the CR, and because of that OPG logo's are all over the event. If OPG's money somehow ends up going to the GLR, the money will go down to the GLR, but their logo's won't.

Also, IMHO, the regionals that raise a ton of money should be able to enjoy the money for their regional. Money doesn't just drop the the sky (for the most part), people have to work hard to get it, so is it really fair to take it and put it somewhere else? I vote no.

As for scrapping the team parties: In comparason to the video screens, the parties are cheap. All the equipment and people that are needed to run the screens cost a lot more than the parties do. So getting rid of the parties would save some money, but I doubt it would be enough (unless you got rida ALL the team parties from everywhere, and as I mentioned I don't think thats right).

well that's definately not cool. all i did during Motorola Midwest and West Michigan regionals this past year was dance in front of the cameramen and try to get on the big screen. now what am i going to do?

in other matters, though, it's going to be a lot harder to see the matches going on from way up in the stands. this stinks.

About the team socials...
 

You have to remember that the team "socials" will no longer include any dancing whatsoever. None. Zip. 0. Therefore, one of the main reasons a team would attend the party is gone.

I think the social should be done away with. It's a hassle to run, it has already caused injuries, and pop culture and FIRST don't mix (as Dean has said, many many times). There are plenty of other, good, dance clubs in town.

The audio/video wall was cool, because you got to see some additional action. However, the crack cameramen aren't really required - if you want to cut costs, just have a single camera give a top-down view of the field on the wall (which I feel must remain to give teams a good sense of what's going on, audio cues can be easily forgotten).

Any comments?