[Jaine Perotti]

I don't like it when I see the phrase "gracious professionalism" flung around without first examining the situation very, very closely and objectively. I think we need to be a bit more careful in that regard with this discussion. What actions/rules do or do not constitute "gracious professionalism" is very subjective, making it poor fodder for an objective, non-emotionally driven argument.

One can look at this particular rule from many different angles with regards to "gracious professionalism". One could say that this rule does embody GP because it allows all alliances to have the same amount of time to fix their robot in between matches. Yes, it may seem "GP" to the spectators when an alliance allows their opponents extra time by taking another time out, but how fair is that to the other alliances on the field? They might not be lucky enough to be given extra time by their opponents, and they would be put at a disadvantage. Did you ever consider that perspective before calling out the rule as "un-GP"?

I'm sorry if the above came off as sounding harsh, but please - next time you are discussing a rule, can you please leave the GP phrase out of it? Stick to the specific implications of the rule when supporting your argument. It is completely inappropriate to judge a rule as being "un-GP" when you haven't yet considered every side to the story and all the facts surrounding the situation.

A recent example - the recent blizzard caused many teams to complain that FIRST should have extended the ship date. I felt that alot of people posted inappropriately, saying that "if FIRST had any GP, they would extend the deadline." A better way to go about this (which many other people did properly), would be to discuss and present arguments using the particular facts of the situation in calm and reasonable manner. It was also important to consider FIRST's perspective, reasoning, and response to the situation before labeling it's actions as "un-GP".

So, with regards to this rule, I think people need to step back and consider that perhaps this rule is (arguably, anyways) fair because it gives everyone the same amount of time to fix their robot. Just as FIRST gives everyone six weeks to build their robot - they also want to make sure that no alliance is given an unfair advantage over the other at the competition. It is not in fact "gracious" to try to circumvent this rule, because it's not fair to the rest of the competitors.

-- Jaine