RoboCup 2010 - The Final (copyright by Reuters)

Long time claimed, but impossible to demonstrate. With these words could have been described the goal scored by CHITA team to CMU (Carnagie Mellon).

Long story made short. During last RoboCup, in the match won by CMU, our team scored a goal from our half-field by using back-kick. The video is unavailable, inexplicably the CMU guy claimed: “I did not record that…”.

We believed that the proof of our moment of glory was gone forever, buried just in our memory.
But we believe in Internet! And, finally we have the proof!

“I’ve never seen back-kick scoring like this in real soccer,” he said after one of his robots found the net with a spectacular back-heel against a team from Carnegie Mellon University of the United States.

Read the complete article for discover the identity of the one!

(btw the source is reliable, is nevertheless the “Reuters“)

We will start the official competition on Monday, and that means we have still time to be better!
Our first test against Nao Devils was quite a mess: the behaviour was ok, but it has a critical bug preventing a good playing.
We fixed this, so next time we will play better, but they can fix bugs too…
BTW, do not worry, I believe we can made it.. LA VINCIAMO!!!!

Now, it is time to go to bed… but stay tuned for another update tomorrow (if I will survive to the humidity…)
AH! For those of you are eager to know the results, point your browser here…
Let’s go win SPQR!

The schedule are already on the net, check it out here.

Now, I have a plane to catch, so… see you on the other side of the world!

A key moment of the Open finals

What happen to the SPQR team? Well, the first two matches were quite bad, bad colour calibration, bad behaviours and some integration trouble.
The last one was actually quite good. Everything we developed so far was integrated and working. The colour calibration was redone and the overall behaviour was somehow the expected one.
Unfortunately we lost at the penalty kicks: our robot reached the ball, but for a bug in the code never kicked the ball.
Too bad for a team that worked every day trying to do its best. The newcomers were a little bit frustrated by this debacle, but I know that this could be a chance to do a better job.

And there will be a good occasion to prove our value very soon: our team will participate to the 1st RoboCup Tournment in Greece, held on May.
Thus, fellas, let’s back to work and let’s win the prize!

Thursday 18th

• 9:00 – 9:30 Opening ceremony
• 10:00 – 11:00 Practice matches for TV
• 11:00 – 12:00 Practice matches for schools
• 15:00 – 18:00 Round robin

Friday 19th

• 10:00 – 11:30 Round robin
• 12:00 – 14:00 Lunch time
• 14:00 – 15:00 Round robin

Saturday 20th

• to be decided: Semi-finals
• to be decided: Finals
• 12:30 Ending ceremony

The teams were grouped in these pools:

Pool A		Pool B
A1	Nao Team Humboldt	B1	SpiTeam
A2	MetroSpelBots	B2	SPQR (Cheetah)
A3	Kouretes	B3	Les Trois Mousquetaires (L3M)
A4	Austrian-Kangaroos	B4	Los Hidalgos

Finally, here there are the round robin:

I will keep you posted about the results. Hope to see there!

For facebook-addicted, we have an event too: check it out here!

Remember to bring your caps, some flags, a very big cup of pop-corn (or two, one for me ) and some friends!
I wish you enjoy the games!

Dear RoboCuppers,

Thank you very much for your patience regarding the status of RoboCup 2008. We are happy to announce that we now fully expect RoboCup to go forward in Suzhou in July as planned.

(bold mine)

So, guys, the worries of previous days are now went away. RoboCup will be in China, and we are glad about that. Really?

Mmm, yes a sort of that. I was obviously disappointed to not go in China, but I was now aware about this possibility and changing mind several times in few days is very stressful.
After the Tibetan protests, and the earthquakes of previous days it seemed that China was not the best place for RoboCup. (Incidentally, I’m very concerned about thousand of deaths. May these people have much more considerations from West.)

Besides, there are many troubles now. Will be able to obtain a VISA in time? Will be able to find fund for tickets? What about the accommodation? And my holidays?

These questions are very urgent and we are currently trying to find a solution.
For us it would have been better to procrastinate the RoboCup.
But decision is made now and we have to work hard to do our best.

For the last question now it is necessary to know how many days I will be able to spent there (after the RoboCup). And maybe I will use my Lonely.

I will cross my fingers, please do the same
Gambatte!

Dear all,
We are currently in forward-moving negotiations with the Suzhou LOC and feel hopeful that an agreement will be reached to keep RoboCup 2008 in Suzhou, China during the planned dates (July 13-20, 2008).
Please do NOT change your travel plans or airline tickets. A final resolution will be issued by coming Friday or earlier.

Today is Friday, it is still uncertain, but this time it seems pretty sure it will be there, again.

I don’t mind about the location, but please, please take a decision!

After the bad news yesterday, it seems there is a little hope.

Dear all,

Following up on the previous message, the trustees are now working hard to   ascertain the situation and will let you know the final status as soon as possible. We will do our best to make sure that there will still be a RoboCup 2008 and will keep you posted as further information is available. For now, please don’t make any new plans, but please also don’t cancel plans. The decision will be made this weekend.

What the hell is this? There will be a RoboCup this year or not?

Let me reassume what we know.

• this year RoboCup will not be held in Suzhou, China;
• there will be the Olympic Games, in Beijing (August 8th-24th);
• there is some “Olympic issue” that does not permit the event;
• there will be some kind of event, somewhere;
• there will be a decision soon, maybe at the end of the week.

These are the only things we know at the moment. But we can go further…

The following statements are my own opinions, they are not related to any “official” source, they are “rumors” and my free thoughts.

Ok, let’s think freely.

We know that China is not able to hold RoboCup these year. Why? It seems they underestimate the issues related to the Olympic games… But wait, what the hell are these “issues”? I have some ideas: visa problems (another), the Tibetan question (another), some fire problems.

I guess China discovered it cannot control all things during the Olympic games: the manifestant, the western television, what we think and believe. Moreover it cannot assure security of people coming to its cities, but Beijing and neighbour. Maybe all of this was unpredictable, and recent monk manifestation expose its vulnerability to world opinion and external attacks. Will Olympic games be safe for athletes? I really hope so…

Ok, but what we should do now?

First of all, do not cancel your flights yet. Keep working on your robots, software, whatever. I’m almost sure there will be a RoboCup (rumors…), but we do not know where, yet…

Maybe it will be in Germany, or Japan. Certainly it not will be in Italy, I’m sorry but you would not take an holiday here.

Maybe a real RoboCup will not be possible. I believe there will be some limitations, due to practical reason: who is ready to organize an entire RoboCup in 2 months? Thus, a distributed version maybe could be a possibility. For example Rescue league at NIST and Humanoid in Germany, Virtual league could be remote.

(I secretly hope that Standard Platform League will be held in Japan…)

At the moment only two things are (almost) sure: there will not be RoboCup in China, and it will be delayed/moved to another location. But we have to wait until the final decision of trustee…

Please be patient…

© Lonely Planet

Yeah, just buy a book it is not a good reason to be happy, but it means that I’m planning to visit China.

Like every year, next July I will partecipate to the RoboCup competitions, and after a week of hard work I will take a small trip with my friends. Are you wondering where? But in China of course!

To be honest I’m a little bit worried about what Chinese government are doing: they are killing Tibetan monk manifesting for their freedom. I’m very upset about any human rights violation (I’m a member of Amnesty International).
China is not an exception. Moreover with the Olympic Games held in Beijing, it seemed that something should have changed. I guess China is loosing opportunity to change the world.

This trip will the occasion to explore a small part of an ancient culture, which nothing have to do with current Government. It is a pity that they have such a awful behavior.
I will go there for the ancient culture and not for what China is now. And I’m sure that chinese people are not the same. In the future I hope they will understand how to tolerate and respect life of human beings.