The Human Angle

So, I'm writing this article on roller derby. I've chosen to take the human angle, as the robot angle didn't seem to offer as much depth as one would imagine, and because very few robots have ever played roller derby. Sure, there was bot derby greats like "Hot Bot II" of the Houston Hard Drives, "2 Sexy 4 Your Bot E" who skated for the Riverside Roller Bots and "Transducer Trauma" who was a popular jammer for the Seattle System Crashers. As I understand, bot derby was much-heralded at the outset, but ultimately failed to capture the attention of a large fan base, which is so necessary in order for a sport to get a solid toe-hold in society. But then there's baseball, which just goes to show that there are always those rare exceptions.

In taking the human angle, I had a better chance of getting some good interviews, as humans are usually interested in themselves and when asked to talk about that, they are usually happy to oblige. Bloggers are especially likely to wax long in their explications of self, and are an easy target. However, I've found that their tendency to veer way off topic can be somewhat distracting.

By the way, here's a picture of Dot Matrix, one of the first proponents of bot derby: