This thread started out as a good discussion, but I feel like it's slowly becoming cancerous and may get a lock soon if we start bringing up dead horses.
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Originally Posted by AquaMorph
I feel like inspiration and building a better robot should not be placed above learning to solve a design challenge. From personal experience I learn more if I figure out solutions on my own rather than copying an answer.
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Isn't gathering resources and performing research one of the first steps you take when solving a design challenge? When I go and design a circuit for a power amplifier or some other circuit, I look at datasheets and sample circuits for my chips and modify those schematics. The same principle applies here. "Copying" a build blitz or Ri3D is using a public resource that's freely available to everyone, so I don't know why anyone wouldn't want to look at it and perhaps use it. I don't see how this is different from using the Kitbot or anything else in the kit of parts, or any gearbox or COTS item made by AndyMark or VexPro.
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I understand that teams don't have to copy or even look at Ri3D but from talking to people on several teams I have discovered that their motivation to try and come up with original solutions has been dampened. I know of one team in particular that is planing to build one of the Ri3D robots part for part. Will that team learn as much as they would have if they had to create a robot without Ri3D?
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I'm willing wager that a team that uses build blitz or Ri3D will learn as much as a team that doesn't use it, but the content which they learn may be different. A team copying the build blitz or Ri3D designs may learn more about how to improve those existing designs and how they work, whereas a team that comes up with its own solution may learn some things about prototyping and mechanical design.