Friday Night Entertainment - will.i.am with special guests

[alectronic]

the einstein feed is pretty ok too. Not much, but its something!

[Steven Donow]

I'm seeing people on Twitter say that the special is airing August 14th at 7 PM on ABC, and is called, "i.am.FIRST."

[alectronic]

Originally Posted by stevend1994

I'm seeing people on Twitter say that the special is airing August 14th at 7 PM on ABC, and is called, "i.am.FIRST."

Nothing showing up from ABC or google or all, probably hasn't been officially announced yet. Sounds great though!

[Tetraman]

Originally Posted by techalex

You can hear the show a bit on one of the ftc feeds:
http://mfile.akamai.com/18569/live/reflector:24609.asx

Wow, that sounds super eerie.

[George A.]

Ok I can say without a doubt that this concert was well worth the minor inconvenience of switching fields. The only nit pick was will.I.am calling it USFIRST and the 8 year old Will Smith video, still it was a great show and the crowd loved it (well maybe not Willow Smith)

I'll type more once I get a proper keyboard but I can't wait to see where this thread goes.

[Wildcat]

Originally Posted by George A.

still it was a great show and the crowd loved it (well maybe not Willow Smith)

Second.
Honestly IMO it was a pretty bad concert overall. There were some cool things like the elevating platform on stage and the celeberty interview clips. It was pretty cool to see jack black. By far the best part of it all was when Miley Cyrus' video came up and she got boo'd. Now for the bad: There was a godly amount of bass, so much i swear my liver was shaking. I'm not a fan of the peas type of music to begin with but i can usually tolerate it. All of the music sounded pretty much the same. Another thing was the amount of auto tune, those people that know vocaloids will know what im talking about when i say That concert had more auto tune than a vocaloid song. There was also way too much use of strobe lights, it was very irritating. Willow Smith was painful for me to listen to, and didn't really seem to fit in with what was goin on. For it being my first concert, it was very disappointing. By far, the worst thing about it was the severe lack of cowbell. There was no cowbell what so ever. Had there been cowbell that would have completely changed everything for me.

[santosh]

Originally Posted by Wildcat

Second.
Honestly IMO it was a pretty bad concert overall. There were some cool things like the elevating platform on stage and the celeberty interview clips. It was pretty cool to see jack black. By far the best part of it all was when Miley Cyrus' video came up and she got boo'd. Now for the bad: There was a godly amount of bass, so much i swear my liver was shaking. I'm not a fan of the peas type of music to begin with but i can usually tolerate it. All of the music sounded pretty much the same. Another thing was the amount of auto tune, those people that know vocaloids will know what im talking about when i say That concert had more auto tune than a vocaloid song. There was also way too much use of strobe lights, it was very irritating. Willow Smith was painful for me to listen to, and didn't really seem to fit in with what was goin on. For it being my first concert, it was very disappointing. By far, the worst thing about it was the severe lack of cowbell. There was no cowbell what so ever. Had there been cowbell that would have completely changed everything for me.

So what is the general consensus. I mean it is hiphop. Bass is gonna be crazy for the most part.

[MooreteP]

The show was awesome. Great for the FLL kids to the suits. What a great celebration of the 20th year. Any negative expectations should be dispelled by now. Tomorrow will build on this energy. I've been "involved" since 1998, and this was a positive evolution. Best dancing since Disney. Great message. FIRST in every community. Ride the wave. Make it happen. Congrats to the Hawaiian Kids.

[Chris Hibner]

The show seem pretty well received. All of our students loved it.

As far as the dome / field in the pits thing: I LOVE the fields in the pits and I hope FIRST continues to do this. My only gripe is that the bleachers need to be about 20% bigger.

[Karibou]

Man, that was cool. Aside from the fact that we all got $150+ tickets for free, I was SO cool how into it wil.i.am and the Peas were. There was obviously a lot of effort put into it, shown by the videos from others in the music world, the entire stage (with official BEP stage crew), and the overall FIRST integration.

Downsides include excessive bass, crowd surfers, and the awkwardness of Willow's performance. She did her part well, but we weren't the right audience for her. We definitely aren't her target audience, which I assume is pre-teen/early teen girls, and I don't think she was expecting the lack of crazy enthusiasm.

Ryan Devlin was great, IMO. He did know sort of what was going on, and going into the crowd and doing the Twitter shout- outs made it a lot cooler.

[Marc P.]

Originally Posted by Karibou

We definitely aren't her target audience, which I assume is pre-teen/early teen girls, and I don't think she was expecting the lack of crazy enthusiasm.

My guess is that was aimed at the FLL students, as part of the effort to celebrate all of the FIRST programs. If the majority of the audience was FRC teams, I can imagine the lack of enthusiasm, reminiscent of Mandy Moore's reception at the 2002 Championship.

[Alan Anderson]

Originally Posted by Madison

I don't believe that for half a second.

I believe it for about ten seconds, myself. The amount of attention and space being devoted to FTC does make it plausible that they couldn't satisfy their need to give it prominence and still have all five FRC fields on the dome floor. I think the main problem with what they want to do is that FTC just doesn't work as a stadium sport. The fields and 'bots are too small.

It looks to me like everything would fit if they put FTC and Einstein at opposite ends of the dome...but that would mean inconveniencing one program by having it at the "back" side of the show, and it would place the FRC division fields perhaps too close together to keep the sound from one from interfering with another if it was too loud.

Originally Posted by MooreteP

The show was awesome. Great for the FLL kids to the suits. What a great celebration of the 20th year. Any negative expectations should be dispelled by now.

Hardly.

I knew I didn't care for their music before I went, but I still expected to be entertained. The word that describes what I got instead is "assaulted". I mean, you'd think that people designing the lights for a stage show would know to point them at the performers! I probably saw less than half the show because of the spotlights blinding me, and the strobes kept me from seeing a lot of the other half. The music was too loud by far; the bass literally had my clothes shaking in the breeze, and it was impossible to make out most of the words because they were drowned out by the rumble. I could hear the words if I covered my ears, but I still couldn't understand most of them.

And what was with that electric ninja DJ at the end?

[artdutra04]

According to Bill at FRC Live, the decision was made to move one field to the pits (due to moving the FTC fields next to Einstein) long before any notion of a concert or will.i.am came into the picture, due to physical geometry issues arising from moving FTC right next to Einstein. The addition of the stage for the concert caused another field to need to be moved into the pits, which at least evened it out and allowed them a more fair method of swapping positions.

Honestly, the biggest thing people need to know about the concert and the lack of music on Einstein and a lot of other different things at the St Louis Championships are all easily explained by one thing: this really is becoming the Super Bowl of Smarts.

The Super Bowl is operated around television cameras, announcers, and film/production crews. The Super Bowl needs a half time show. The Super Bowl is a lot of fun for the participants and spectators in person, but the event itself is much larger with a lot of attention paid to also making it enjoyable for the tens of millions watching at home.

For years FIRST has been telling us the Championship Event was the Super Bowl of Smarts, and this year it actually was. The FIRST Championship is going to be broadcast on Sunday evening primetime television on a major network. We had a half time show by the same artist who performed at the actual Super Bowl, in a concert that was donated and otherwise could have brought in millions in ticket revenue. The Dean's List and Chairman's Award (including equivalent FLL and FTC award winners) were celebrated during this half time show, with Regional Chairman Award winning teams enjoying the entire concert from the floor in front of the stage.

While there were a lot of minor things that could be tweaked and improved*, the overall new focus of the Championship was more than worth it for the participants there and everyone who will definitely enjoy the show at home on August 14th, 7pm, ABC. And as will.i.am said at the event, "FIRST is already cool, we're just making it louder!"

* The fields in the pits need to be moved next to the entrance so visitors who lack safety glasses and/or closed toe shoes can still enjoy watching the matches, and a third section of bleachers (similar to the arrangement at the CT Regional) need to be added.

[pfreivald]

The show was well-received by my team, including the student who didn't want to go.

...and at the mentor breakfast, Dave Lavery talked about how it was part of a strategic plan to reach kids who otherwise might not make it in the door. I believe the line was a comparison to teams who offer free pizza at their informational meetings:

"I came for the pizza, but stayed for the robots."

So this is:

"I came for the Peas, but stayed for the robots."

If it works, AWESOME. If it doesn't work, then a major performing act gave a free concert of their own volition (they approached FIRST, not the other way around) to our kids. Also awesome.

---------------

I expected and wanted to be grumpy about this, but I'm not. The kids enjoyed the heck out of it, and it has the potential of really reaching a bunch of kids who might never get into FIRST.

[Koko Ed]

Originally Posted by Chris Hibner

The show seem pretty well received. All of our students loved it.

As far as the dome / field in the pits thing: I LOVE the fields in the pits and I hope FIRST continues to do this. My only gripe is that the bleachers need to be about 20% bigger.

Make it 50% bigger and do constant checks to make sure they are staying together as inteneded as the weekend goes on. I saw Newton's bleachers bouncing up and down and comming loose when people stepped on them. That is not good.