Sunday, April 02, 2006

Scenario

  • A scenario is a narrative, a story. As such, it should have a at least a little bit of plot.
  • Give names to the people in your scenarios. In addition to making the people seem more real (and interesting), it makes it easier to refer to them in later conversations.
  • In addition to names, give the people a background, a story. This helps convey why they act the way that they do.
  • Feel free to use your own story and name, but put your story in the third-person (say "he" or "she" instead of "I").
  • In addition to showing how your characters use Chandler, it may be helpful to show them struggling to do the same thing with their current PIM/email client.
  • Remember that not all human behavior is particularly admirable. Please include scenarios of people trying to do bad things with their tools.
  • Make it fun!
Found these points...might be useful to keep in mind

Nanobots Not Needed

Nanobots Not Needed

SUMMARY: The popular idea of so-called nanobots, powerful and at risk of running wild, is not part of modern plans for building things “atom-by-atom” by molecular manufacturing. Studies indicate that most people don't know the difference between molecular manufacturing, nanoscale technology, and nanobots. Confusion about terms, fueled by science fiction, has distorted the truth about advanced nanotechnology. Nanobots are not needed for manufacturing, but continued misunderstanding may hinder research into highly beneficial technologies and discussion of the real dangers.

Nanobots have plagued nanotechnology from the beginning. Eric Drexler’s Engines of Creation (1986), which introduced nanotechnology to the public, described certain kinds of tiny robots with limited capability. But in some fiction and fanciful speculation, these “nanorobots” or “nanobots” possess near-magical powers: transforming any object into anything else, acting as a universal medical device, or destroying anything they touch. This idea has caused confusion about the actual goals of advanced nanotechnology1 research.

Originally, nanotechnology was about building stuff from the atoms up. “Assemblers” were specialized molecular construction machines. “Disassemblers” were research tools to figure out how to make things. A programmable atom-based manufacturing system would be able to build as many more systems as desired. But all these ideas merged with the nanobot concept, plus a heavy dose of science fiction, to create the idea of a single machine that could do it all—and might run wild, turning the world into a “gray goo” of self-copies.2

Meanwhile, the meaning of “nanotechnology” was being stretched. As funding opportunities increased, researchers in related and distant fields of nanoscale technology adopted the term to describe work they'd been doing for decades. By 1992, Drexler had to coin “molecular manufacturing” and “molecular nanotechnology” to indicate what he originally meant by nanotechnology.

Studies have shown that most readers don't know the difference between molecular manufacturing, nanoscale technology, and nanobots. Most nanoscale technologies use big machines to make small products. Molecular manufacturing is about tiny manufacturing systems. But those manufacturing systems are not nanobots.3 Modern plans for molecular manufacturing do not involve self-contained nanoscale construction robots at all.

No one worries about an inkjet printer crawling off the desk and stealing ink cartridges. Molecular manufacturing systems will be no more autonomous than inkjets. Early, primitive, microscopic systems will not even have onboard computers. In advanced designs, called nanofactories,4 the molecular fabrication apparatus will all be fastened down in well-ordered ranks inside a much larger structure. All designs will be externally controlled and supplied, capable of producing a duplicate nanofactory in about an hour—but only on command.

As nanoscale technologies begin to move from the lab to the marketplace, and attention turns to molecular manufacturing research, it will be increasingly important for journalists to counter outdated and incorrect ideas of nanotechnology and molecular manufacturing. Both scientists and the public have gotten the idea that molecular manufacturing requires the use of nanobots, and they may criticize or fear it on that basis. The truth is less sensational, but its implications5 are equally compelling.

European view of nanotech in 20 years

European view of nanotech in 20 years

See the report by Ottilia Saxl, founder and CEO of the Institute of Nanotechnology, UK, for the European Commission Expert Group on Key Technologies for Europe. Titled Nanotechnology – a Key Technology for the Future of Europe (PDF), it includes on pages 26-28 a scenario of the role of nanotech in 2025. The technology will sound familiar, but the political context is quite different from most U.S. nanotech scenarios (emphasis added):

“Rogerio remembers the days when people travelled by car or aeroplane, until droughts, fires, famines, plagues and hurricanes became so frequent that the scientific evidence for an imminent, irreversible ecological global disaster could no longer be ignored. Governments had to then make some very hard-hitting decisions to ensure the survival of the planet, and the continuation of the human race. Travel was forbidden, except in emergency, new forms of energy use were enforced through legislation…

“Surprisingly, also, the bank had done rather well out of the new world order. The use and development of these new technologies had been enforced by law, and this meant a new role for the bank in providing finance. By law also, banks today had to use a high proportion of their surplus to support projects in specified regions of the world at very low interest rates. Not popular to begin with, but the benefits were now apparent. However, it had been sad to see so many businesses such as those involved in import and export of out-of-season fruits, flowers and vegetable, and those needing a high energy input such as glass factories, go to the wall.”