LEGO Mindstorms Will Survive

thufir writes "LEGO has released a press release, where they dismiss the rumour that MINDSTORMS is being taken out of production. For some reason the changes in product policy lead to the misunderstanding that they would totally drop the product. 'Hearsay has it that a product range like LEGO MINDSTORMS is no longer in focus. This is not true. On the contrary, MINDSTORMS, CLIKITS and BIONICLE are all good examples of products the company wants to stake on.'" See our previous stories, Lego to Stop Producing Mindstorms and Lego Goes Back to the Basics.

at last something smart

[dummkopf]

not only do geeks in my former physics department write grant proposals to get lego mindstorms and then race them, they are actually an EXCELLENT toy for teens to learn to program, robotics, ... what the standard lego building blocks do for kids in the age range 3 - 8, mindostorms do in the dange 8 - 15 (clearly these numbers are not bounded on top): foster creativity! so... why drop an educational tool which has proven to be excellent. i guess lego knows what is good and what is not. what i hated with lego (as a big fan since i can remeber), is that in recent year there have been more and more specialized blocks which are useless and completely kill the main goal of lego: use your imagination to make a plane out of bricks. giving the kid a wing was a bad idea, IMHO, because kids then would be bored. after all, you got the wing out of the box, so why spend time trying to figure it out!

Glad they're keeping Mindstorms

[Bigman]

I was somewhat bemused when I read the previous press release, they can't be killing Mindstorms, I thought to myself. After all, of their entire range, Mindstorms is practically unique - the only cheap 'control system' experimentation kit for all ages. And yes, it is cheap, in the context of the alternatives.
Don't know about the bionicals thing though, I've never really looked into it.

Slashdot is a rumor site

[Junks Jerzey]

Between this and all of Mac rumors that get posted...maybe the tag should be changed to "The latest dirt for nerds?"

Re:Good thing they keep mindstorms, but ...

[Raptor CK]

But Bionicle brings in the cash. It's a building theme with a story, and as such, it's been doing well, especially since it's all homegrown.

The trick isn't to look at Bionicle as a building kit for vehicles and structures, but to see it as an action figure building kit. This has become especially obvious as the limb pieces have become more and more diverse. Sure, it's slightly limiting, but it's also the single best source for ball-joint parts, which on their own aren't so bad.

Kids buy it because their cool action figures. Everyone else seems to like ripping them apart for the useful pieces, and making some pretty wicked looking skeletons of whatever creature comes to mind.

Re:Whew!

[BoldAC]

I don't know... but this looks like a great way for legos to get a whole lot of free press.

1. Hint that they are killing Mindstorm
2. Tons of people talk about how great Mindstorm is
3. Public gets informed about their great product.
4. Squash the rumors and say "We will continue to sell the Mindstorm products that you love"
5. You know the rest...

Nice working of the system to get some free, targetted advertising. Bravo!

AC

Bionicle? WHY?

[Anonymous Coward]

Am I the only one who saw those Bionicle commercials the first time they came on and was like "WTF?". I was watching a mvoie on Cartoon Network I think and they kept showing these commercials for this Bionicle thing but they never explained what it WAS. Finally some months later I saw a comemrcial for LEGO Bionicle sets and figured out that that is what it was.

But who came up with this stupid idea? They created some really convoluted mythology that makes absolutely no sense to sell what amounts to lego action figures with some kind of tribal futuristic snowboarding theme.

If they really want to focus on their better products, they should have KEPT the harry potter and star trek sets and gotten rid of this nonsensical CRAP.

Oh and the problem with stuff like star trek sets and harry potter sets is not that they have a theme, but that they have all these specialized parts that are completely useless for anything else. The whole point of lego is to be able to build the set and then take it apart and come up with new stuff to build. But when stuff like an imerial fighter or whatever comes with huge fixed wings as a single solid peice that will never look like anyhting but an imperial fighter wing, (or whatever those ships are called) you can't exactly use the parts to build a truck instead.

Lego doesn't need to get rid of their specialty sets. They need to CHANGE them so that the come with MORE parts, and LESS specialty parts. Make the kids make the big flat vertical wings out of a big octagonal peice with some smaller octagonal peices stuck on it. But leave the bumps. Don't make one solid wing.

And get rid of that stupid ass Bionicle.

Re:Various languages for Mindstorm programming

[Anonymous Coward]

I've always thought they missed the boat by not using LOGO. Granted, more can be done with the others, but if your really trying to teach kids nothing beats logo.

Re:When did legos begin to diminish creativity?

[potus98]

Whew! This is a tough one. As you start to zero-in on a particular brick or set, you quickly realize how this becomes a slipperly slope.

I'm okay with the mini-figures and town/castle sets -probably 'cause that's what I grew up with. But the aqua-zone sets had overly detailed paintjobs on many of the pieces that diminished the imaginative part and often limited those pieces to under-water adventures.

But then I think about the town and castle paint jobs. They had pieces with Exxon stickers, police station logos, stone walls, etc... Did THOSE pieces limit my imagination and I just didn't know it?

What about that little spaceship zooming around the moon logo on the space sets?

Maybe all legos should be restriced to a single color and one of 8 shapes: You could have a line, a square, a "T", an "L".... DOH! That's another poll/thread!

Re:News for nerds, indeed

[Maarek_1]

Perhaps he just hasn't met a person interesting and creative enough for him. Anyone who would think less of a person because they have Lego constructions in their house is not what I would call desired genetic material anyway.
You should do what makes you happy anyway!!

Re:Whew!

[iabervon]

I'm personally in favor of any advertizing strategy in which step 2 doesn't involve paying anybody. It's the mark of something that's actually worthwhile if people will actually preemptively eulogize your product, instead of just shrugging.

Re:When did legos begin to diminish creativity?

[zaffir]

The painted faces were part of it, but it really got bad when LEGO totally dropped the cool, unique sets (anything from Pirates to Space Police to the Aquazone) in favor of the licensed ones that are 90% unique pieces.

Re:Whew!

[Overly Critical Guy]

Where did they "hint that they are killing Mindstorm?" Oh, they didn't--only Slashdot did? I see.

Re:News for nerds, indeed

[bgarcia]

Anyone who would think less of a person because they have Lego constructions in their house is not what I would call desired genetic material anyway.

OR.... maybe you can't get a date because you keep calling them "desired genetic material" instead of "women".

Re:News for nerds, indeed

[iocat]

It's an interesting problem. To think of it from the girl's perspective, try cats. If you went to a girl's place and she had a cat, you might think. "Oh look, she likes cats. This indicates a number of things about her, all reasonably positive." But if you went to her house and she had like 11 cats, you'd be like "oh man, she's a freak."

A few LEGO projects may indicate a whimsical, curious personality. Too many LEGO may indicate to the women that they will always be second-place to plastic blocks, or other toys. I think most women look for some balance, and extremes in any direction -- too many star wars figures, too many lego, too much money obviously invested in the home theatre -- runs the risk of driving them away.

Or it could be his bathroom isn't clean enough. That's always a deal-breaker with the ladies.

Re:When did legos begin to diminish creativity?

[JonKatzIsAnIdiot]

[X] Never did, but the Slashbots don't understand it.

I don't understand whole 'Bionicles diminish creativity' thing. Have you ever actually watched a kid play with them? Mine do, and the stuff they come up with is pretty wild. They'll look at an instruction book and find something they like, but being too impatient/stubborn to actually follow instructions, they'll figure out how to build it themselves.

The fact is, original Lego is great for building orthagonal structures, but terrible at anything else. Circles, angles, joints, gears, wheels - none of these can be built with 'regular' Lego blocks. Putting these things in gives the builder additional options and enhances creativity rather than diminishing it. Besides, how can you have a decent Rockshi vs. Hogwarts battle without them?

The people complaining about 'diminished creativity' remind me of old farts sitting in their rockers complaining that 'things aren't the same as they used to be'. You (and they) are right - things are different. Lego has changed and that's good.