[gblake]

Originally Posted by Knufire

My argument had nothing to do with the people participating in the competition and telling them what they should or shouldn't do.

All I stated was that FRC robots require lots of resources to make, are good for macro-level inspiration, but might not be as efficient in terms of micro-inspiration per resource than other programs. You suggested the same, use other programs and materials... ...to generate micro-inspiration.

If we agree that FRC and these other programs have separate roles in this strategy, then lets not try to make FRC just like all these other competitions. Let it become something that is good at macro-inspiration and let the other programs and materials be used for micro-inspiration.

OK - I think I see what you are getting at.

Sounds like you are describing the possibility of a radical shift in the reason for creating an FRC team (largely removing the parts that currently emphasize grass roots action). It's not implausible, and I can imagine a future in which FIRST decides to push FRC in a direction like that, but when I look into my very murky crystal ball, the probability seems awfully low for at least another decade.

Blake

PS: I don't think what I described was an attempt to make FRC into anything. I thought I was describing current FRC, implemented well. If what I described sounded different, that wasn't my purpose.