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Posted by Lora Knepper.

Student on team #69, HYPER (Helping Youth Pursue Engineering & Robotics), from Quincy Public Schools and The Gillette Company.

Posted on 6/21/2000 6:09 AM MST


In Reply to: BattleBots on Comedy Central & NEW Innovation FIRST products posted by Dan on 6/20/2000 5:29 PM MST:



Ok, I may be getting myself into some really hot water for what I'm about to say, but that's never stopped me before...

Battlebots is not cool!

There, that makes me feel better. (Now, I want to say right off, if any of your teams have a Battlebots team, I'm not critizing you directly, just the idea behind Battlebots.) I want to know what's so great about seeing all your hard work go out there and get smashed into tiny bits in the first 3 seconds. And it always turns into wedge with a sledgehammer vs wedge with a spear or something (now, in FIRST, wedge bots are interesting and plain cool, so I'm not knocking the design of your bot Dan!) It turns into a match of who can flip the other the fastest....BORING!!!

Now look at FIRST. Exciting and challenging game that changes every year. Something that promotes engineering in a positive and fun light. Still a very vigorous contact event, *most* robots survive competition. Plus there is a diversity in the bots that Battlebots could never have. Just take our two bots as an example: Team 10 - great agressive defensive bot that uses the wedge shape as an advantage. Team 69 - long, tall monkey bot that could steal and cover goals as it was needed.

Besides, arn't there enough machines of destruction out there? Let's at least make something helpful to mankind, and though there may be no immediate real life use for FIRST bots yet, it is teaching us about engineering and 'Gracious Professionalism.'

Am I alone on this theory?

Lora