[thefro526]

For what it's worth, there's not a single thing wrong about copying a concept from any, or all of the RI3D Teams and/or BuildBlitz Teams. Heck, if someone wanted to, they could build a replica of any of those machines to a reasonable degree of accuracy, and I still don't see all that much of an issue with that.

The problem isn't copying someone's design, or 'finding' design inspiration from their results. The problem is copying those machines without learning from them, or trying to make something better, or more efficient or even just making it look cooler. There's a massive amount to be learned from reverse engineering someone's design, even if the completed CAD model is published - all the person copying the design has to do is ask 'why?'. Why did they use this? Why did they do that? Along the way, I'd wager that the person copying would learn a heck of a lot more than one would think.

When I first started in FRC, my team (816 at the time) was routinely in the bottom 25% of performers at almost every on-season event we went to. Initially, we seemed to have this unjustified ego about our design, or our method, believing that because it was something original, and not built by engineers, that our mediocre performance was some how validated. In those first few seasons, I learned a lot, but not a lot about how to do things the 'right way', more of how not to do things, or how not to handle myself.

Once I became an upperclassman and had both the respect and support required to 'try something different' I drew inspiration from machines that I'd seen that were successful in one way or another. I'd look through old robots, study old designs, and try to find something that I could 'borrow' for my own needs. In doing so, I limited the failure points of the design down to our execution, but not the overall concept. In 2008, and 2009, our machines were heavily inspired by those that we had seen in 2006 and 2007 and also machines found on the internet from 2002 and earlier. Both of those machines (2008 and 2009) were arguably the two most effective machines that the team had ever built until that time, and we always were quick to admit that 'all we did was take a bunch of things that worked for other people and re-purposed them'.

When I became a mentor on 816, I continued to teach students that there was nothing wrong in drawing inspiration from someone else's results, as long as you do something to make it better, or your own - and you learn from the experience in the process. The last two robots 816 built while I was still a mentor are perfect examples of this - the 2011 robot was heavily inspired by 1902 2007 and 148 in the same year and the 2012 machine was for all intents and purposes a 'copy' of 254 / 968 in 2006. By drawing inspiration from proven machines, it made it so much easier to focus on the problem at hand - successfully executing whatever we chose to do in the 6 week period of build season, and to inspire and learn during the process. I can only imagine what would have happened had we chosen to go it alone and do something 'different' as we had done in my first two years....

Anyway, back to the topic of RI3D and BuildBlitz - in the last two years, these have been an absolutely Amazing resource to reference as a baseline, especially considering how unique 2013's challenge was (historically) and how critical robot to robot interaction is going to be this year. Yes, these robots do cut down on some of the 'different' designs we see each year, but I would imagine that many of those 'different' designs are replaced by machines that are going to be much more likely to complete the game objective, and more than likely, inspirational.

I look at my old team, who essentially built an RI3D 'clone' in 2013 after some major leadership changes happened between the 12 and 13 seasons, and I honestly believe that it was the best decision they could have made. Their robot wasn't amazing, or super competitive, but it could score, it could drive well, and they obviously had faith in it. After seeing them make it to the finals, once on-season and once off-season, I can assure you that each student on that team was inspired in one way or another by that robot - even if it was just a copy of another.