Petition to end the shouting of ROBOT

[Koko Ed]

To be honest if you want to make a petition how about one to have people stop clogging up the pits using it as a social club and stop blocking the entrances and exits which is equally rude and obnoxious and a fire hazard?

[dcarr]

Originally Posted by Koko Ed

To be honest if you want to make a petition how about one to have people stop clogging up the pits using it as a social club and stop blocking the entrances and exits which is equally rude and obnoxious and a fire hazard?

Or teams who expand their pits and occupy nearly the entire aisle...

As far as I'm concerned, 'green shirts' at events should feel free to be as aggressive and proactive as possible to eliminate pit crowding. I really respect teams that do it right.

[Anupam Goli]

Originally Posted by Koko Ed

To be honest if you want to make a petition how about one to have people stop clogging up the pits using it as a social club and stop blocking the entrances and exits which is equally rude and obnoxious and a fire hazard?

BEST robotics does this at their events. They assign 5 pit passes, 4 student and 1 adult pit pass. I'd rather not see FIRST do a system like that, since media often walks through the pits, but I'd like it if teams emphasized that the pits are not where socialization happens, and neither should students who don't know much about the robot come in groups to the team pit and start harrasing them, asking them what is wrong. Our team has every student that isn't pit crew stay in the stands scouting matches or doing pit scouting in groups of 2-3. Our pit is rarely crowded, if ever, since everyone has a job to do.

[CENTURION]

Originally Posted by Wing

BEST robotics does this at their events. They assign 5 pit passes, 4 student and 1 adult pit pass. I'd rather not see FIRST do a system like that, since media often walks through the pits, but I'd like it if teams emphasized that the pits are not where socialization happens, and neither should students who don't know much about the robot come in groups to the team pit and start harrasing them, asking them what is wrong. Our team has every student that isn't pit crew stay in the stands scouting matches or doing pit scouting in groups of 2-3. Our pit is rarely crowded, if ever, since everyone has a job to do.

Our team has been talking about implementing a similar system just for our own pit. Besides the drive team, and one supervising mentor, there would be a limit of one or two students/mentors in the pit area.

[dcarr]

Originally Posted by CENTURION

Our team has been talking about implementing a similar system just for our own pit. Besides the drive team, and one supervising mentor, there would be a limit of one or two students/mentors in the pit area.

We issue the nice metal-style nametags for our pit crew/mentors, both to allow judges and other teams to know who they are talking to, and to make it clear who is allowed to be in the pit.

[Koko Ed]

Originally Posted by Wing

BEST robotics does this at their events. They assign 5 pit passes, 4 student and 1 adult pit pass. I'd rather not see FIRST do a system like that, since media often walks through the pits, but I'd like it if teams emphasized that the pits are not where socialization happens, and neither should students who don't know much about the robot come in groups to the team pit and start harrasing them, asking them what is wrong. Our team has every student that isn't pit crew stay in the stands scouting matches or doing pit scouting in groups of 2-3. Our pit is rarely crowded, if ever, since everyone has a job to do.

To be fair it's often parents who want to come down too the pits as well. I remember at GTR West one year I saw a team of 30 just covering the pit aisle with 30 people including a baby in a carriage.It's as if they had no concept there were other teams in the pits with them.

[dcarr]

Originally Posted by Koko Ed

To be fair it's often parents who want to come down too the pits as well. I remember at GTR West one year I saw a team of 30 just covering the pit aisle with 30 people including a baby in a carriage.It's as if they had no concept there were other teams in the pits with them.

It's always awkward asking parents to leave the area when they just want to see what their son or daughter has been working on for the past 6-8 weeks...but it's also really necessary. "Pit browsing" should be encouraged for all visitors but not clogging up one area.

[Zebra_Fact_Man]

Originally Posted by Koko Ed

To be honest if you want to make a petition how about one to have people stop clogging up the pits using it as a social club and stop blocking the entrances and exits which is equally rude and obnoxious and a fire hazard?

Here in lies the problem I feel. My team wouldn't have to yell robot (or say "excuse me" if that's what you really prefer) if their team wasn't standing where it shouldn't be, in the pit road.
Honestly I see no difference between "Robot" and "Excuse me my robot is coming through" except for the unnecessary length of the second one. "Robot" is crisp, concise, and gets your point across quickly that there is a potentially dangerous and heavy mobile object moving in your direction and to be alert (the world needs more lerts).

As to the practice of announcing you robot in less filled areas: there are a number of teams in my area that are in the practice of walling off their pit (with shelves or totes or use a tent), so that unless you are directly in front, you can't see in or out of it. There's no telling is someone is going to come barreling out at any moment into your robot transit team (which I HAVE seen on occasion when "robot" was not announced). Same goes for adjacent hallways and rooms. Preemptive announcement is much better and safer than running the risk of collision. I have no control over what other team's members do, but I do control what my team does. If you find it annoying that I let you know every time when my robot is passing your pit, you'll just have to take one for the team, so to say.

As to the use of robot declaration, it should ALWAYS be the person leading the robot train (who is at LEAST a handful of feet in front of the robot cart) and NEVER the person pushing the robot cart. That gives people more time to react.

I find it actually kind of funny the disparity I see in the pits; of the 4 competitions I've been to the past 2 years, the overwhelming majority of pits (75%+) have either more people in them than they should, or the pit is completely empty (everyone is at/to/from the field). Not sure which one is worse.

[Alexa Stott]

I CAN'T STAND WHEN PEOPLE YELL "ROBOT." IT'S RUDE AND OBNOXIOUS AND, HONESTLY, MANY OF ITS DEFENDERS IN THIS THREAD ARE ONLY REINFORCING THAT POINT.

AND TO WHOEVER POSTED THAT DISCOURAGING PEOPLE FROM YELLING IS A BILL OF RIGHTS VIOLATION--YES, YOU ARE MORE OR LESS ALLOWED TO SAY WHAT YOU WANT; YOU'RE ALSO ALLOWED TO HAVE YOU AND YOUR TEAM COME OFF AS A BUNCH OF RUDE, ARROGANT KIDS.

[CENTURION]

I see what you're trying to get at with the "yelling" text Alexa, but it's a bit of a different situation when you're in a loud, crowded pit area.

I get the feeling that the different ideas about whether it's "rude" or not just have to do with the local cultures that attend those regionals.

In WI, I've never heard anyone talk about calling "Robot" as "rude" (Can't say I've taken a survey or anything though)

Then again, in the midwest, we sometimes say "yeah" in place of "you're welcome", and from what I've heard, that's considered offensive and rude in other parts of the country.

I don't think this is something that should be decided on a whole-organization level. Maybe each regional can decide for itself?

In any case, we're no strangers to FIRST culture, we know that the person yelling "ROBOT!" is not trying to be rude, or offensive, or obnoxious, they're probably just trying to be safe.

[Sam390250]

Wisconsin Regional Safety Officials were requiring teams to do this, and it was very obnoxious.

Incident with our team, one of the drivers was politely saying, "Excuse us, we need to get through" while pushing the robot. One of the safety officials was in the way and said, "I am not moving until you loudly shout 'Robot!'". This is clearly unnecessary and is forcing/encouraging students to be obnoxious. It also makes the pit a tense and more stressful place than it already is.

[Siri]

Originally Posted by theanimal160

As the man pushing our robot around at the STL Regional, yes, having to yell EXCUSE ME ROBOT COMING THROUGH was on the way to and from every single match. There were two or three times when it was clear, and the only notable time I can remember the pit lanes being truly empty was after the last match of the finals.

This doesn't answer my question. Of the people who hear you yell "excuse me, robot coming through", how many of them are actually in a position that impedes your travel or risks their safety? Unless your definition of yelling is very different from the dB standard, if this is greater than say 10%, the pits are way, way, way too crowded. This causes numerous other safety issues which are not addressed--and are in fact compounded--by the yelling to which you refer.

The aisles don't need to be empty for polite, inside voice, requests to work. Anything but. In fact, they can be quite crowded. I probably ask 20 people to move every time we queue, and it still goes faster than yelling robot to 10x more people than actually need to move--the latter is desensitizing, so people who are actually in the way react more slowly and must maneuver in a now more entropic situation. Now, overcrowdedness poses numerous problems, but yelling is more an attempt to mask the symptoms than address the cause.

Originally Posted by CENTURION

Robots often may have protruding arms or elements that (while inside the frame perimeter of course) may still hit people who thought they were out of the way. If you direct your warnings only to the people in front of you, who are in your way, people on the sides of you may not be looking out for you.

I'm trying to imagine how this is possible. Does your robot overhang your cart or have an abnormal shape, etc? How can someone think their out of the way while being inside the frame perimeter?

[Nemo]

I completely agree.

I pasted this link into the Week 5 event survey. Somebody should send this thread to Underwriter's Laboratory and FIRST brass. Anybody got connections? If they got on board, they could simply tell all of the event organizers to push this concept in the future.

[Nirvash]

Originally Posted by Sam390250

Incident with our team, one of the drivers was politely saying, "Excuse us, we need to get through" while pushing the robot. One of the safety officials was in the way and said, "I am not moving until you loudly shout 'Robot!'". This is clearly unnecessary and is forcing/encouraging students to be obnoxious. It also makes the pit a tense and more stressful place than it already is.

I personally do not like the shouting of robot, and find a safety official doing that just weird.

[EricH]

Originally Posted by Sam390250

Incident with our team, one of the drivers was politely saying, "Excuse us, we need to get through" while pushing the robot. One of the safety officials was in the way and said, "I am not moving until you loudly shout 'Robot!'". This is clearly unnecessary and is forcing/encouraging students to be obnoxious.

The very next time a safety official does that, I suggest that as many team members as possible get around him and count three, then ROAR "Robot" at him at the top of their lungs. Then, after the match, figure out who to send a complaint letter to about a safety inspector requiring an unsafe practice and furthermore interfering with a team's safe operation to do it.