Customer Reviews

Gearheads : The Turbulent Rise of Robotic Sports

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We celebrate athletes of strength, agility, and skill. We do not celebrate nerds, who not only do not win, but do not compete. As the twentieth century was closing, though, nerds who had a special fascination for electromechanical gadgets had a previously impossible sport in which to show creativity, cunning, and a killer instinct. "Gearheads" these particular nerds were called, and their games were played under the names of "Robot Wars," "Battlebots," "Robotica" and others. While it remains to be seen if this revolutionary form of competition will be long-lasting, the sport has had a colorful beginning and plenty of people interested in it as spectacle. _Gearheads: The Turbulent Rise of Robotic Sports_ (Simon & Schuster) by Brad Stone is a funny, sad, and weird account of how these metal crunching monsters compete, and how greed and litigation ruins dreams.

It is important to realize that the robots described herein are not necessarily machines that we would think of as robots. The gearheads' robots are manipulated by a controller in the same way that hobbyists operate radio controlled cars. But for competition, RC Car Joust didn't sound nearly as good as Robot Wars, and so the inventor of this competition, Marc Thorpe, expanded the definition. He was interested in starting a commercial venture that would give his family a sound future, and had been intrigued with machines that did performance art and some primitive mechanical jousting. Unfortunately for Thorpe, he had to find a backer. His partner, Steve Plotnicki, surely had the money; he was a record executive who had been responsible for such acts as the seminal rappers Run DMC. The eager but naïve Thorpe didn't check much into Plotnicki's record, which included vituperative litigation against his former stars. _Gearheads_ is largely about the legal battles that followed, and they are as vicious as any of the buzz saw, pneumatic ram, and knife battles that took place in the Robot Wars ring. The legal battles are long, and sad, but more entertaining are the description of the gearheads themselves, and the way they participated in a hobby that turned into an obsession for many of them. One of them says, "The thrill is hard to describe. It's better than fishing, a whole lot better than baseball. It's fighting and it's not fighting. It's just boys at play."

Along the way, Stone describes the decades of violent and very noisy, not to mention illegal, robotic performance art spectacles arranged by Mark Pauline and his Survival Research Laboratories. Pauline was much more interested in the dadaism of destruction (and troublemaking in general) than in rule-bound competition. Also here are Woody Flowers, the MIT teaching genius who teamed up with Dean Kamen, inventor of the Segway, to start FIRST (For Inspiration and Recognition of Science and Technology), robot competition for high schoolers that stressed cooperation as much as competition (and thereby seems to have lost much of its entertainment punch). Combining portraits of some very peculiar inventors, a troubling tale of lost fortunes and litigation, and amazing descriptions of battles between Spiny Norman, Blendo, Biohazard, Thor, Ziggo, Ginsu, Mechadon, and others, _Gearheads_ is fine entertainment, and might be an important documentation of a new sport's genesis.

A fascinating and often depressing look at how robotic combat moved from the hobbyists and performance artists into the world of courtrooms and television deals, and how greed and mismanagement almost killed the sport before it had begun.

The book also tells the story of the builders, who were often unaware of the whole story and only wanted to to build and compete with the best robots they could build.

And it's a story of a community that exists to this day. Of people with vision who still see bright future for robotic sports.

But most of all, it's a fascinating warts-and-all look into the people who brought robotic combat to the mainstream audience. The decisions that were made, the court battles that were fought, the robots that were built, and the triumphs and disappointments of everyone involved.

The only downside of the book is that it focuses almost exclusively on the big events. Maybe in a followup book, Brad (or someone else) will take a longer look at the many other smaller scale competitions that are held all around the country, and the regional organizations that are popping up as then robotic community continues to grow.

But, it's a minor quibble and I can heartily recommend the book as a great place to start learning about one of the very few sports that rewards intelligence over brute strength.

Great, quick, fascinating read.
I was expecting a story about the niche of robot wars. But this book turned out to have a broader scope, detailing a compelling story about the culture and business behind the world of entertainment. The book has several vivid characters who seem to lose all perspective in their passion to get a piece of the action when robot battles start to take off. What's cool about that is that Stone has witnessed this from the inception of a new entertainment phenomenon. But I was left wondering if there are some universal truths here about the greed that attends entertainment dealings.
But I also didn't feel like the book shoved its point of view down my throat. It drew me in, told me a story, and laid out a lot information, but let me reach my own conclusions about who was right, and what went wrong.
One bit of subtlety I particularly appreciated pertained to the media's role in this whole story. The robot makers -- and promotors of robot battles -- are consistently asked by the media if they are promoting violence through their robots. But the real battles were taking place between human beings using the courts to take control of the sport. Indirectly, it nicely showed what a red herring it can be to blame entertainment for promoting conflict, when we have so much unecessary fighting going on on the sidelines. robots don't kill people, lawyers do.

Brad Stone's book is by far the most complete and informative work on the growth and development of robotic combat, from its beginnings as unorganized street fighting to television productions. As a late arrival to the sport, competing from 2000-2002, on all three shows Battlebots, Robotica and Robot Wars, I can attest to Brad's fair and unbiased reporting and am amazed at his absolutely thorough research on the subject. If robotic combat is a passing fad, 100 years from now, historians will use this book as part of the culture that defined the start of the new millennium.

http://www.robotdojo.com

Hats off to Brad Stone for pulling back the curtain on the riveting world of robot sports, and exposing how a pasttime enjoyed by passionate garage tinkerers was slowly chewed up by commercialism and greed. It is, in so many ways, a uniquely American story, and I must admit, there were moments it was painful to watch. But Stone has written a compelling narative, and it rewards the reader with a close-up look at the real heroes of this otherwise tragic tale--the hobbyists who never lost sight of the idea that meaningful pursuits don't need to be rewarded with a big cash payday. It's a cautionary tale for anyone who lived through the tech boom and bust of the past decade. To me, the most amazing aspect of this story is that it took this long to finally be told.

This book is for anyone's who's ever had a good idea and wanted to know what it takes to make it a marketable success. Marc Thorpe's story had to be told. Learn from his mistakes how to survive the greatest challenges entrepreneurs face in launching a brilliant plan. The most violent robot imaginable is nothing compared to the players in this story. You'll be shocked to read of the depths some people will go to profit on someone else's hard work and innovation. It's an engrossing story illustrating the classic battle between greed and creativity; proving yet again that greed will always win in the short term and always lose in the long term. Robot enthusiasts will find the back story concerning the big personalities (human and robot) enthralling. As for the rest of us, like me, who never paid robots too much attention, you can't help but be drawn into the drama and human interest of this business battlefield. Excellent book.

As a Combat Robotics competitor for the last 7 years witnessing the turmoil as this new sport gets started I found this book to be an amazingly in depth account of the events that unfolded. I thought I knew most of the history, but was amazed in many sections of how much I didnt know. More importantly I think this book has a larger relevance in that this is most likely the track that any new popular sport may take in the modern litigious world.

Alexander Rose of Inertia Labs...

This book tells the tale of the birth and rise of robotic combat. From its early roots in art and the classroom to full blown TV shows and live events. It gives insight into a niche of society, a community, of builders, event promoters, and moneymen. It exposes the passion and darker side of the sport. It details the savage legal battles that are more destructive then the robots themselves. With the evolution of the sport came many growing pains and new offshot species of robots and shows and this book exposes it for all to see.
As a veteran of robotic combat, I highly recommend this book to anyone who had questions about the how and why of this crazy sport.
" Robot Darwinism"

A friend, a late comer to the scene, very powerful competitor, loaned me his copy of this book, very marked up and highlighted, and also introduced me to some of the people like Trey in the book. I purchased it as a gift. I am not directly in the field.

This book is somewhat similar to Steven Levy's Hackers, and a number of lesser works like Fire in the Valley. The history of "robotic" combat is comparatively short. It's similar to Roman bread and circuses. The author creates sympathy for the ill originator of the idea (a Lucasfilm technician) and easily picks on entertainment industry moguls/lawyers. Unfortunately, the history is dated (over 6 years since these events of the late 1990s and earliest 21st century, so the big problem is figuring out the "come-back" (an epilogue is needed)).

It's a fast paced read, and likely a few errors, and while interest is world-wide, it mostly happens in California (Bay Area and LA). It covers none of the academic, industrial, or military robotics and focuses purely on avocational, gaming combat.

If you wondered the whys and wheres of such shows like Battle Bots, Robot Wars, Robotica, Junk Yard Wars, and even Dean Kamen's FIRST came from, this is an informal and fairly OK way to read about them and the dynamic of the people behind this social phenomena.

It's Fight Club meets Fry's Electronics and model radio control with a sprinkling of the RIAA and MPAA.

This a story in which a business contract that a man signed called for him to make his "best effort" with regard to certain business objectives. The book tells of the severe circumstances under which he made his best effort. . . and all that followed.