[Pendulum^-1]

Originally Posted by nuggetsyl

After reading the the thread on open build and several other threads about how to improve First it is more evident then ever FRC needs real competition. Competition would

Drive down costs for teams
Make friendly build rules
Improve the quality of awards handed out.

Monopolies are never a good thing. I love First but think an open market approach would solve many of the issues we see posted here on C.D.

Ummm....maybe. One thing I will say, though, is that the off-season events are a really good, lower cost way to get a lot more out of your season. And that, in and of itself, helps to drive down the cost, in that it gets FIRST thinking about alternatives (districts) to the mondo-big regional events.

FIRST and the vendors do need to keep thinking up better ways to give teams better return on the investment that each year represents.

FIRST also needs to get better information from those who are not in FRC. Many organizations have dropped out of FRC due to time or money cost, or looked at the barriers to FRC success, and have said, no thanks. FRC needs to determine a better path to transition these organizations into FRC, or else FRC growth will be stunted.