Possible FLR Hacking?

[boomergeek]

Originally Posted by Matt Krass

If you read my post (instead of just looking for something to be annoyed about) you'll see I also stated he should learn from this is regards to how he wrote the post. I believe he also understands he approached this thread the wrong way, and that is a valuable lesson to learn. However, another, incorrect lesson, that is being pushed here is that uncomfortable topics need to be tiptoe'd around and those who dare to confront them are wrong strictly because it's an uncomfortable topic.

Yes, he jumped to conclusions, and yes he made a mistake. And yes, he acknowledged that. That doesn't mean broaching the topic was a bad idea, just that next time, be a bit more careful how it is done, and I'm sure he will be.

Nobody ever did anything great by playing along and not making waves, sometimes waves need to be made. As far as your teams troubles go, I'm sorry you had them and I'm sorry you were unprepared. Personally, I don't think there's any shame in getting caught by something you didn't know was a problem, now you learned your lesson and you'll watch out for it next time. I'm sure you wouldn't appreciate someone coming on CD and ripping in to you for not thinking to check your robot for a problem you weren't aware existed.

Matt

I did read your whole post: my point is: the heat of a loss is never the time to publicly insinuate that someone may have the ability to cheat and used it against you. I don't know how Brandon could have written it publicly and still be graciously professional. Maybe you can suggest a few sentences of what he could have publicly written that would have been appropriate to get his sentiments across.

Insinuating problems should be investigated or blamed on the dishonesty efforts of others without any real evidence is a "sour grapes" meme that unintentionally disparages the competition. Brandon seems to have acknowledged this: you seemingly have not.

If you play a friendly card game and lose, it is not appropriate to immediately publicly ask if one of the friendly players cheated in the timeframe that the valid winners are enjoying their props.

One can choose the level of awareness to the potential for cheating. FIRST tries to be friendly, professional, and gracious.

I do not know how Brandon could have publicly approached the subject of his feeling his team was likely a recent victim of cheating at a FIRST competition in a manner would be seen as graciously professional.

If you can, I will certainly admit I was wrong and apologize to you.

I don't think Brandon should be ashamed: in fact, he's better for having made a mistake and admitting it and moving on. You seemed to imply that Brandon had just chosen the wrong words. I think it's not the words that were the issue- it was the sentiment, timing and location of that sentiment.

There is a huge amount of this competition that is mostly an honor system.
There are also many EASY ways to cheat that do not involve hacking- I'm going to assume that those ways to cheat aren't used sufficiently to worry about and I'm going to spend my energy elsewhere.

Are you starting with the position that there are likely enough cheaters involved in FIRST that we should spend our brainpower looking for them?

I have focused my brainpower on looking for the understanding of the laws of nature on highly complex equipment causing the seemingly nefarious robot behavior. I view it as time better spent.

I think we can agree that the right time to be broadcasting talk about potential hacking victimization is not the day the winning team is supposed to be celebrating their win.