Subject:
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Re: Custom Sensor poll (Re: Mindstorms on Slashdot)
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Newsgroups:
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lugnet.robotics
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Date:
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Fri, 2 Dec 2005 18:14:23 GMT
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Original-From:
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dan miller <(danbmil99@yahoo.)stopspam(com)>
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Viewed:
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1431 times
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<rant>
This is all completely doable. Look how Botball mixes lego and other parts:
https://botballstore.org/catalog/index.php?cPath=25&osCsid=f5f1e570822331ae6d570ec399f4f4fc
they choose suppliers; they provide lists of what is legal. It's like any
other competition; you may need a judgement call here or there, but it's
pretty clear what the rules are.
As to the poster who said TLG is Ok with interoperability, Google up their
fight with Megabloks. Admittedly, this was an assault on their core market,
but the fact is that Lego has been extremely aggressive about protecting
their basic monopoly on lego-compatible bricks (in spite of the fact that
their patents ran out years ago. I can rant offline about abuse of the
patent system; the protection is specifically supposed to be for a few years
so that afterwards, the IP can be used by others. But I digress..) Botball
builders still have to use hot glue to attach servos to their 'bots; no one
would dare to build a Lego block that included a servo, or even made it easy
to mount one.
The problem with saying "they won't mind" about one idea or another is, you
can't build a company on the hope of an international corporation's
continued largesse. As soon as your sales become significant, or they don't
like you for any reason, they can just pull the plug and start suing.
Fact remains that they are dictators when it comes to this. What I am
advocating is a stated, irrevocable policy of allowing compatible pieces,
perhaps with some of the core building pieces excluded. That way, small
co's could come up with interesting extensions, leveraging on the existing
infrastructure of thousands of blocks for building, which is what TLG seems
to want to concentrate on. We all know their high-tech expertise in
software and electronics is not their core competency.
They are making the classic mistake of all centrally controlled
beaurocracies: they don't have the resources and/or ingenuity to extend the
empire, but they don't want anyone else to have any control or reap any
rewards. So they prefer to limit the scope of what everyone can do with
their products, rather than loosen their grip.
The obvious remedy in economic theory for this situation is, someone else
comes along and takes the prize. Like technics, vexx, or some kid in a
garage we haven't heard about yet.
</rant>
-dbm
--- Brad <brasstilde@insightbb.com> wrote:
> > Many people in the LEGO community are "LEGO Purists". If LEGO did
> > give
> > a company or product a "LEGO Approved" stamp, would you use it,
> > knowing
> > it wasn't actually made/sold by LEGO?
>
> > Would such parts be "legal" in "Mindstorms Only" contests?
> >
> > If not, what's required to make them legal?
>
> If the intent of "official" or "legal" parts lists is to level the
> playing field, so that it's the skill of the builder, rather than the
> list of parts, that wins the contest, then a simple declaration by the
> contest organizers would seem to be sufficient.
>
> Where it gets a bit murkey is if the contest doesn't supply the parts,
> but requires the teams to buy their own. If an "official" part makes
> the robot more likely to succeed, but is so expensive that only one team
> can afford it, then it probably shouldn't be considered for that
> competition unless the organizers are willing to purchase one for, or
> lend one to, each of the participants.
>
> I for one would be willing to use non-LEGO parts in my own models if I
> could be assured that the quality was worth it. Note that that doesn't
> mean they necessarily have to "LEGO approved", but I have to know that
> they work with and won't break or burn out any of my other stuff. An
> official stamp of approval from TLC would likely serve that purpose.
>
> The only thing that keeps me from using some of the current non-LEGO
> sensors at the moment is the cost.
>
> Brad
>
>
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Message is in Reply To:
 | | Re: Custom Sensor poll (Re: Mindstorms on Slashdot)
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| (...) If the intent of "official" or "legal" parts lists is to level the playing field, so that it's the skill of the builder, rather than the list of parts, that wins the contest, then a simple declaration by the contest organizers would seem to be (...) (19 years ago, 2-Dec-05, to lugnet.robotics)
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