[Jason Morrella]

It is true, it hard to do a new field and game every year, and it does typically get better each week. While I do appreciate the efforts to defend us/FIRST in this regard, I do think the issue is fairly simple - and I will repeat what a few others have stated:

We charge teams/customers a price to participate in the program. The teams in week one pay the same amount as the teams in week 5. Every team, at every event, deserves to have the same quality experience. It is not good enough for us to be pleased that we get everything fixed by week 4 or 5 - it is our/FIRST's responsibility to have it working correctly (not perfect, but close to) in week 1 and every week after. In my view, there is really no other issue at play here. While we can list many valid ones, the reasons and excuses really don't matter - our customers deserve a working system every week, and it is our/FIRST's challange and job to make sure we can start to make that happen every year, at every event. (getting off soap box now).

I can say that everyone in FIRST is aware of the issue, and there are some very capable people who have joined FIRST recently who do seem committed to getting these issues addressed immediately and in the future. We do anticipate having the glitches from today fixed much quicker than in years past, and hopefully the events tomorrow will run very smooth.

The scoring system issues aside, I have been completely wowed by the teams and students I have observed in this first week. The quality of the robots is great, and more importantly the quality of the people, the gracious behavior, the sportsmanship and the atmosphere at the events is as impressive as ever and reminds us all why we are doing this. (based primarily on the 46 teams I've been able to observe in Portland, but also on reports I've heard from people at the other three events).

Keep up the great work teams, have a great time at your events tomorrow and in future weeks, and be proud of what you have accomlished.