[Foster]

I was part of the VEX split. Two things happened, I took my many hundreds of dollars worth of parts and created VEX teams. I then took my many hundreds of hours of personal time and created events. The same as many others did (Blake) and you now have the VEX of today.

If I'm at FIRST HQ looking at the mission statement on the wall to "inspire" and look at the showcase events, I'm going to go "more showcase, more inspire" and decide to have two WC. (Not sure why they stopped there, I'd gone for 5, Europe, East Coast, North Coast, South Coast and West Coast, with the AsiaPac one in my back pocket when there were enough Down-under and China teams for the Hawaiian Teams to compete with. More Worlds! More Inspire!!

Remember FIRST is an INSPIRE company vs a WINNER company.

Someone posted that we were customers of FIRST. Yes the same way I'm a customer of Comcast. I want robotics/internet I send cash and maybe help out at an event. Neither FIRST/Comcast management ever thinks about me or cares what I think or do. I'm replaceable. Look at the 100's of 1 and 2 year teams that are gone. Too Bad So Sad. The only difference between Comcast and FIRST, people at FIRST know who I am. They BOTH still don't care when I call.

Bottom line:
-- This is a done deal
-- This was done as a way to inspire MORE NEW ROBOTEERS
-- You can stay and help, or you can go, but we are inspiring NEW ROBOTEERS
-- And yes, you can go and form "SECOND" with some of our current teams and new teams and we think that is great! There isn't enough robotics out there and having you start your own stuff means more roboteers are INSPIRED, Yay both of us!
-- Sorry about Detroit and Houston. Seen their tourism numbers? They suck. We are a big deal. We will get you cheap rooms and we got a cheap venue, you won and we won and we inspire together!
-- See you at the town hall where you can figure out how to help us out for free! (We'll bring pizza)

Sorry my cynic badge was flashing, but this is how you should read this deal. 1700 post on CD is worth it's weight in electrons, about the same as a small gob of warm spit.

Sorry CD, time is over for the denial, move to the next stage of acceptance.