[Kevin Kolodziej]

I have several thoughts on this:

- I never have liked sound systems on team's war wagons - pit announcements usually are quiet and hard enough to hear when working on the robot.
- Eliminating noise in the pits takes away the spirit from teams like the Bomb Squad who (at least used to) have their entire team cheer its way to the field with the "Bomb Squad...Bomb Squad" chant.
- The FLL motto is "Sports for the Mind" and FRC is billed as the "NCAA of smarts." Both of those are sport related comparisons...and what do you find at sporting events? Music, noisemakers, and all that good stuff.
- On the same note, if people expect it to be a sporting event, they expect it to be loud. Have earplugs available at the door if you must...but if FIRST is worried about scaring away spectators with loudness, they've got their priorities mixed up.
- Live bands in the stand have been a bit annoying, IMHO. When you go to a game (HS, College, or Pro), you don't take your own pep-band, you let the hosting team take care of that.

I guess this would probably mean that the little "yeah" battle that we created on Hammond a couple years ago would be outlawed too, because that was pretty loud and we did it at the most random times and in the most random places. I guess if this is enforced, everyone will just have to adopt the "silent cheer" that Hammond came up with in 2001 (hands are waived back and forth).

Kev