Gracious Professionalism > Ungracious Unprofessionalism

[Steve W]

As a mod on these forums it is tough to get through them all. It is even tougher to find ways to decide what is and is not a good or allowable post. We do our best and kudos for all of the other mods who usually beat me to the problems.

To start with, I believe that the only bad question is one that is not asked. Sure it seems wrong that someone ask what a CIM motor is or how many they can use but that is in my eye not the askers. We need to train them on how to find things and where. To teach a child to speak , do you get mad at them when they can't say DaDa or do we keep repeating, in loving ways, to encourage the learning curve. We need to be more sensitive on how other people see things because they always don't have the same perspective or insight that you/we do.

The bigger issue is the constant slamming and put downs that I have been seeing. The FIRST bashing that goes on (I am guilty sometimes, I know) really needs to stop. We/I need to find other ways to get to FIRST and have them listen. Sometimes I think that if we push hard enough here that FIRST will do our bidding when in truth, they are probably not even listening. This is not their board and they do not have to read here even though some do.What would be the impact on CD if we implemented a NO FIRST Bashing policy. That does not mean that we cannot discuss problems but that we just don't bash FIRST (or others).

It is the responsibility of every member of CD to help make the boards better. If you see someone making a bad post or needing help with the search engine, then we should be PMing them with helpful suggestions and not slamming them with neg reps. We all need to pitch in and it wouldn't take much to improve the best robotics site in the world.

The large growth of FIRST and CD is great but will also bring a larger demand on all of us as we try to educate and demonstrate what FIRST stands for. GP was not explained to me but shown. My first experience was at my first event as a spectator in Cleavland. What I saw in the pit area was all I needed to see in order to understand GP. It also sold me on FIRST. GP is best shown and lived and not talked about.