[FTC]: FVC (Vex) VS. FTC (Tetrix)

[bellpride]

Originally Posted by NalaTI

http://tinyurl.com/krt2o9

Are you inviting JVN to do pull-ups using VEX parts?

Originally Posted by JesseK

Topics that haven't been discussed:

• Number of mentors per student for each program

Zero for our six VRC teams. Many also have zero, some have one or two, very few have a whole bunch.

Originally Posted by JVN

If you repeat a lie enough times it starts to become the truth. Not enough people do their own factual comparisons but instead they just repeat generalizations not grounded in quantitative analysis.

What was most disappointing about the transition was the truly ungracious way in which FIRST pursued it. Tetrix was introduced not only with subtle "lies" like the ones mentioned before, but even through making fun of the VEX Robotics kit (in one blog post, it was even called a toy). I can't imagine how much this offends long-time FIRST-supporting IFI employees, like JVN, Jason Morella, Karthik, and countless others, along with teams which thought their hard work was viewed as real engineering.

The past is the past though. Looking at the replies, I think the current FTC has a long way to go until it catches up with VRC.

[Chris is me]

Originally Posted by bellpride

What was most disappointing about the transition was the truly ungracious way in which FIRST pursued it. Tetrix was introduced not only with subtle "lies" like the ones mentioned before, but even through making fun of the VEX Robotics kit (in one blog post, it was even called a toy). I can't imagine how much this offends long-time FIRST-supporting IFI employees, like JVN, Jason Morella, Karthik, and countless others, along with teams which thought their hard work was viewed as real engineering.

Rereading those posts now it's really a lot more brutal than I imagined. "The new kit is a true robotics prototyping platform" and other cheap veiled shots like that. I was particularly upset with the apparent lack of communication with IFI that they were switching platforms, and that they decided to drop Vex before having a better alternate available (and they still don't). Oh well, I guess it got me into FRC ?

[Akash Rastogi]

In related news, our team did receive emails from unmentionable names in FIRST repeatedly questioning why we didn't register FTC teams this year. We felt that the explanation of cost benefit and the fact that the students did not want to use the Tetrix kit would be enough, yet we still feel a little bad about it. :/ Oh well.