US FIRST

As a lot of people who know me realize I am addicted to FRC. Well, over the last couple years I have realized that FRC is failing in its goal. It wants to encourage cooperation between people. Bond them together because they share a passion. But at its heart it is a competition. This doesn't encourage open sharing, it encourages teams to keep secrets and not share knowledge. I am a firm believe in open source technologies, be it hardware or software. Today I was told that I shouldn't post pictures of what we can do. Being a new mentor I have to comply at least for the mechanical portion of things.  This is not the spirit of FIRST, yes we should play to win, but we should also play to help others.  This is a battle I have fought for 4 years I feel now, and will always feel, that free flow of information is more important than winning. Knowing I helped one team out with a question, or taught one person something new, or made someone realize something wasn't impossible is infinitely more valuable to me than seeing ONE win.

FIRST recognizes this, the two highest awards aren't for robots. They are for inspiring other teams, for helping other teams, for spreading what FIRST is actually about. If I wanted competition I'd be in battlebots. I want education, intelligence, not some stupid frivolous competition.