[JesseK]

There's some great stuff here already, so let's focus the discussion a little. That MSC Local coverage is pretty nice. The ESPN coverage is what I had in mind. Unless FIRST begins a campaign to spread FRC to people who weren't already looking for it, online coverage may have a great level of success yet I doubt it will ever push FRC to the scale of impact we all claim to desire.

Ike definitely nailed it - it's the downtime filler which keeps the audience drawn in. If we consider 6 minute match cycles, 2 minutes would be commercials, ~2 minutes live non-field coverage (and Ike's list), 2:15 of match footage. The time appropriation is very similar to typical TV (you're being sold to for 1/3 of the time), and also happens to match the Football format - 60 minutes of football plays take ~3 hours to watch.

Perhaps we should focus on IRI specifically and show how it may be able to overcome problems that may have more to do with the typical FRC regional's format rather than the quality of matches. IRI itself isn't constrained by the FRC Regional time constraints. It also brings together the best brains & minds from FRC in the world with the main purpose of being competitive, so I feel confident there would be plenty of story to tell. MSC is very localized (though the entertainment value of the competitiveness is definitely just as high) so it may not ever work for a national stage.

Coverage wouldn't be constrained to several days in a row of the same robots - that may be a bad idea for Television. What if a crew spent the last day of IRI coming up with the filler in the morning, then used it during Elims? Would FIRST be willing to advertise (or solicit for advertising) for that? Would we? This year's IRI had 16 matches in Elims, which (roughly) translates into 2 hours of on-air time. For a pilot year, perhaps that's ideal - but what could we do to extend that to 3 hours while upping the ante entertainment-wise?