Chief Delphi Moderators Censoring Posts

[Daniel_LaFleur]

Originally Posted by Doug G

It didn't take long for an old hack like myself to figure it out (but have told no one).

I, too, am an old hack ... but I won't go looking. I don't want to know.

If some other team gets an advantage over mine because they saw something 3 days earlier than my team did, then so be it. There's nothing I can do about that.

I prefer the 'OH, my!!! ' moment during kickoff to knowing beforehand.

[MooreteP]

MetaKickoff.

I have been waiting with baited breath on New Years eve for the past 18 years in anticipation of the FRC game release the following Saturday.

BITD, there was no stinkin' Game Hint! (We didn't use acronyms or emoticons either)
Then came the NASA broadcasts from New Hampshire, and we had to make sure that the receiving dish on top of our Town Hall was aimed at the right satellite.

Dean, Woody and others would pretend to be Robots on a new field, manipulating the game piece in front of an audience of teams and dignitaries.

Oh, how FIRST has mirrored the changes in technology and our world. The Game release is pretty much pre-produced.
And now we have our own lil' WikiLeaks.

I am enjoying this discussion more than the Game Hint thread.
Ethics, espionage, subterfuge, suppression!

Cheers to all of the comments here. They are, for the most part, thoughtful, intelligent, and enlightening.

Happy 2015.

Get ready for the best "waste of time" that I can imagine!

[wireties]

Originally Posted by Paul Copioli

For those of you think it is "fair game" to spread confidential information once it is public, I say this: I will never, ever consider hiring you to work for me. Ever. No apology, explanation, or other rhetoric will change my mind. You can't be trusted with confidential information.

Ditto! I hope the persons involved learn a valuable lesson - this kind of thing can damage and/or ruin ones education, career and/or reputation. One day you might have to pass a polygraph question phrased EXACTLY like this "Have you ever betrayed a trust?" or interview with Paul (perhaps scarier).

[evanperryg]

Originally Posted by hzheng_449

Just as an observation: I noticed in this thread that there really seem to be two different perceptions of FIRST as an organization. On one end there is a "the small town" or "small company" perception of FIRST, where people feel a real give and take with FIRST HQ and see FIRST HQ in a very personal light. On the other end there is a "big city view" or "corporate" of FIRST. The relationship with FIRST is much less personal. This view sees FIRST HQ as the organization that releases the game rules, runs worlds, and that's about it. I wonder where the position on this spectrum of an "average team" is and where it will shift as FIRST continues to grow. Again, this is pretty irrelevant to the main topic of the thread (though so is much of the debate on this thread anyways). It's just something I noticed, and I was wondering if anyone else noticed it as well.

Fasten your seatbelts, it's philosophy time!

This is a very apt observation, and it has more to do with the original topic than you may think. What i have seen in this thread leads me to think that there is a large portion of CD that subscribes to the "big city" perception. This perception, to some extent, seems to attribute some godlike, infallible poperties to HQ. Many people may think of FIRST as this magical overlord, a "big brother" overseeing teams around the world in the pursuit of a perfect robot. As much as we say it ironically, it seems some may take the concept of "FIRST is love FIRST is life" to the literal extreme, and to this I would like to extend a friendly "get real." We make robots, but we are not robots, and neither are the people at FIRST. None of us are perfect, and neither are the people at HQ. Somebody screwed up and that's alright; the fact that this is the first time in many years that a mistake like this has occurred is truly amazing. When we choose to support the "big city, big brother" pereption of FIRST by hiding their occasional mistakes, we lose one of the most special things about FIRST. It's a community. Every team, every student, every administrator and developer and brilliant mind in FIRST is an independent, yet connected member of this community. This connection, in many ways, is also shared between teams and the FIRST organization, and it is this bond that allows FIRST to work by fostering excitement for engineering through the inspiration that comes with being involved in such a massive, connected organization as FIRST. However, by creating an image of HQ as an Orwellian overlord we distance ourselves from the humanity of FIRST and the incredible binding force which it has created.

Nevertheless, privacy of information is important. Screwing with it with malicious intent is a stupid and shameful thing to do, but the end fact is that somebody messed up and spreading of the information was bound to happen, because people do dumb things. It's been stated multiple times that the entire leak began as a mistake, followed by a misconception in the form of a CD post, followed by some innocent sharing of the mistake, followed by malicious sharing of the mistake. The fact is, people make mistakes, and other people like to take advantage of those mistakes. End of story.

[Christopher149]

As someone who did not see the "leak" (just some of its wreckage), and since it is now a couple weeks into build season, would it be out of line to ask what was leaked? (not trying to divert the thread from its intended topic, just curious)

If anyone feels that it shouldn't be made more public or dragged up again, I'm cool with that. Happy build season to you all.

[asid61]

Originally Posted by Christopher149

As someone who did not see the "leak" (just some of its wreckage), and since it is now a couple weeks into build season, would it be out of line to ask what was leaked? (not trying to divert the thread from its intended topic, just curious)

If anyone feels that it shouldn't be made more public or dragged up again, I'm cool with that. Happy build season to you all.

I would like to know as well, out of curiosity.

[excel2474]

Originally Posted by Christopher149

As someone who did not see the "leak" (just some of its wreckage), and since it is now a couple weeks into build season, would it be out of line to ask what was leaked? (not trying to divert the thread from its intended topic, just curious)

If anyone feels that it shouldn't be made more public or dragged up again, I'm cool with that. Happy build season to you all.

Since the game has already been revealed, I'm sure the moderators will not mind disclosing the leaked info.

Andymark listed an item for sale called "2015 game piece" and described the exact gray tote. No picture of the tote was posted though. Somebody looking on Andymark's website saw this product listing, took a screen shot of it, and posted it to chief delphi. It's now floating around the internet on sites like imgur and reddit.

[Tungrus]

Probably this thread (after it digressed from original question) helped in spreading the "leak" rather than curtailing it. When the discussion turned into "moral", "ethical" and "fairness" etc., there must have been few who were curious to go and look for the "leak" even if the intention was not malicious.

Now do I want to see what was "leaked"? May be, just to see what did I miss on CD that others saw it as leak? Or may be not, why would I care?

[wilsonmw04]

Originally Posted by Tungrus

Probably this thread (after it digressed from original question) helped in spreading the "leak" rather than curtailing it. When the discussion turned into "moral", "ethical" and "fairness" etc., there must have been few who were curious to go and look for the "leak" even if the intention was not malicious.

Now do I want to see what was "leaked"? May be, just to see what did I miss on CD that others saw it as leak? Or may be not, why would I care?

I love these anonymous posters. They have such insight...

[Foster]

So I have to say that had I seen it on the AndyMark site I would have gone "Totes as a game piece? Nope, must be the web guy putting a placeholder in for next weeks release." I mean, really, totes as a game piece?

On the other hand had it been the 5 gallon water bottles I'd been all over posting the "water game is on!!!"

[excel2474]

Originally Posted by Foster

So I have to say that had I seen it on the AndyMark site I would have gone "Totes as a game piece? Nope, must be the web guy putting a placeholder in for next weeks release." I mean, really, totes as a game piece?

I think a lot of people would have suspected it was a mistake, but the CD moderators pretty much confirmed its validity when they removed all posts that talked about it.

[RoboMom]

Originally Posted by Foster

So I have to say that had I seen it on the AndyMark site I would have gone "Totes as a game piece? Nope, must be the web guy putting a placeholder in for next weeks release." I mean, really, totes as a game piece?

There is a wonderful non-profit here called the Baltimore Tool Bank. They rent out all sorts of equipment for 3% of the value of the item - for a week. I was visiting yesterday. (where else can you rent a 100' x 20' clean tarp for $3/week?) They showed me a new item and said "we don't know how to list this on the inventory." I took one look, started laughing and said "In my world that is called a game piece, aka, a tote."

[RunawayEngineer]

Originally Posted by Foster

So I have to say that had I seen it on the AndyMark site I would have gone "Totes as a game piece? Nope, must be the web guy putting a placeholder in for next weeks release." I mean, really, totes as a game piece?

On the other hand had it been the 5 gallon water bottles I'd been all over posting the "water game is on!!!"

Anyone who was slightly familiar 2003 game Stack Attack wouldn't have doubted totes as a reasonable game piece.
It also fit with the popular beliefs that the game piece would not be a ball and that the game would not involve projectiles.

[Tungrus]

Originally Posted by wilsonmw04

I love these anonymous posters. They have such insight...

What has anonymity got to do with this? Normally people will not try to find something they don't know. When they find out potential "leak" curiosity kicks in.

[wilsonmw04]

Originally Posted by Tungrus

What has anonymity got to do with this? Normally people will not try to find something they don't know. When they find out potential "leak" curiosity kicks in.

Actually, I was talking about you.