[Ernest314]

I wouldn't go as far as to want a fully-autonomous game--but the few seconds we do have seems rather pathetic (no offense). I really don't know what the GDC should do, but the current situation seems inadequate. Sure, we need "the human element" and excitement; the fact that FRC is a spectator sport is a good thing. But to accomplish FIRST's mission:

"[...] to inspire young people to be science and technology leaders, by engaging them in exciting mentor-based programs that build science, engineering and technology skills, that inspire innovation, and that foster well-rounded life capabilities including self-confidence, communication, and leadership"

requires more than making students and the public feel like robotics is "cool." There needs to be something more. I get that many teams already struggle with the challenge of the game, but that doesn't mean we should set a limit on how much students can accomplish. Instead, there should be easy tasks as well as difficult ones--I think FIRST is doing a great job with this, for example having part of the autonomous be simply "drive forward".

Back to the definition of "robotics." Notice how the mission statement doesn't even mention that word? FIRST is interested in STEM, not robots in specific. "Robotics" is simply the medium (if you will) that they chose to spread their message. I do agree with OP on the definition of robotics though: even though there are ways to argue for what is and isn't a robot (and teleoperated robots are robots, kinda), current research into robotics is mostly in the autonomous realm. Just take a look at the articles on IEEE Spectrum! So autonomous operation of robots definitely should be emphasized, not just swept under the rug. This could be a selling point; imagine FIRST advertising that they were inspiring students to build robots that performed advanced autonomous tasks. FIRST really can't say that right now.

How should this be done? I don't know. I'm sure the GDC can come up with something though. Give robots more difficult tasks, along with easy ones. Vision targeting is cool, but that hasn't changed from year to year. And the algorithms that students have to use is very simple, compared to some of the mechanical things that students have to accomplish. (Maybe I'm overstating this because I'm a programmer.) Whatever happens, students shouldn't ever be limited by the program.

That was a long first post.

(On a side-note: I realize what people mean when they say that PID is an automated thing, but come on...)