[dbonar]

I'm adding my opinion to the discussion even though I haven't read all of the thread yet. Apologies if I am repeating someone else's comment but this is the only free time I have.

I'm conflicted about the Ri3D videos. However its really just part of the overall conflict in FIRST especially as a smaller team. As a science teacher with an engineering background I want my students to do their background research and start with some idea of the state of the art. Unique and innovative designs are great but with scarce resources in both money and time we don't want to reinvent the wheel or go down too many dead ends. This research should include seeing how others have solved similar problems up to and including other solutions to the current problem.

There is a risk of just copying but its the same risk as just letting a mentor design the robot.