[Andy Grady]

Language is a tricky thing, my friends.

will.i.am is an artist. His job is to incite emotion through his words. He has made an effective career and millions of dollars knowing exactly what the power of the spoken word can do. When he spoke those words at championship, he knew exactly what he was doing...he was trying to incite emotion. He was successful. It was a moment for everyone there, and a good number of people got quite the chuckle out of it given the context of the situation. Of course, some people didn't appreciate it as well.

I don't have a problem with will.i.am saying what he did, in that moment, for the purposes he intended them to have.

Here is where my problem lies...the resonation.

I did not attend championships this year. I did not watch a single second of the webcast. I looked at scores on TBA here and there, but that was it. When all was said and done, I did not see a single quote in my Facebook feed about anything that Woodie said. I did not even know who the WFA winner was, I had to look it up! I saw exactly one post with a link about Dean's homework, that was it. I saw zero quotes from any of the speakers, to which I am sure there had to be someone who said something that meant something to somebody.

I did see will.i.am's comment...a lot. I saw videos, I saw hashtags, I saw memes, and today I am even seeing t-shirts of it.

My question to you is this. If you were trying to sell FIRST to potential sponsors or future teams, would you want to use what has apparently become FIRST's newest catch phrase to woo them to the program?

Ladies and Gentleman, this phrase is the indicator of what the lasting impression of the 25th anniversary championship of FIRST was. Why? Because we live in a world where social media is king, and a message of that magnitude carries like wildfire.

My point is, let the moment be the moment. Let all of those people who were in attendance take it for what it was, an expression meant to elicit emotion. Going forward, however, think hard about the message that YOU want to carry to future generations, sponsors, and media.

Instead of a catch phrase laced with a little profanity, maybe we should be highlighting the success stories of thousands upon thousands of products of FIRST on our t-shirts.