[Jon K.]

I guess my feeling on this is, what is the difference between buying something from company xyz for your robot, and buying something from team 000? The only difference is that you support another team instead of some big company. And why would a team have to buy it from themselves when they can just produce it. I see no issue there, I mean they could stockpile the product but what is the difference the buying out of a company's stockpile in some wearhouse. And how would FIRST be able to regulate all of these things, it would become too much of a nightmare, and besides morals what is to stop teams from doing things like this as it is. And by having teams produce the product, it very well could be cheaper for smaller teams to buy from the team vs. a big company, and depending on scenario, the producing teams could offer discounts or freebies to teams in need, like RAGE did with teams 195, and 809. They needed parts and where strapped for cash and so we helped them out by donated the sprockets to them.