Here are the scenario handouts for the emerging technology scenario game/exercise:

SCENARIO EXERCISE 1

A coalition of textbook publishers have announced an e-book consortium.  This  group, GoodETexts, is starting up with a bang, releasing a joint catalogue of offerings, to be followed by more each season.  Titles cover all major disciplines, and fuller coverage is promised.

Most of these texts are electronic versions of existing titles, emphasizing black and white text.  Illustrations are supported, sometimes in grayscale, otherwise in color.  GoodETexts says more interactive content is forthcoming, as are “born digital” or “digital only” e-books.

All members of GoodETexts must release their e-books in formats readable by laptops, netbooks, tablets, and several e-Readers.  Not cellphones.  Amazon announced that their Kindle can play these formats; so far, Barnes and Noble’s Nook cannot.

Prices are cheaper than print editions by a significant degree, costing between 60-80% of paperbacks and hardcovers.

 SCENARIO EXERCISE 2

A game has appeared on the Web, and it presents content in your field.

The game is free to play.  Users can create accounts, also free, in order to post their scores and comments.  The game is played in a browser, using Flash.

SCENARIO EXERCISE 3

A smartphone app has come on the market, and it contains content in your field.  The publisher is Frank’s Multimedia, a video production firm which occasionally makes nonfiction usable in classes.

The content is multimedia in format (text, images, audio, video, and animation).  Users can consume the content, but also discuss it with any other user on discussion boards maintained by the publisher.

This app is available only for Android phones.

SCENARIO EXERCISE 4

Students are all playing a new Facebook game.  Old and young, locals and visitors, men and women are each crazy about Fantasy Congress 2010.  Worldwide, more people play FC10 than can vote in the biggest state’s election this November.

Fantasy Congress 2010 lets users simulate this year’s election in different ways.  We can run any real election in a few days, seeing how candidates fare in randomly-generated campaign situations.  We can match up candidates from different districts or states, much like fantasy sports leagues.   And players can also track campaigns in real time.

The game is free to play.  Users can pay for a historical version, which lets today’s candidates race against selected figures from American history.

 SCENARIO EXERCISE 5

A new podcast series has begun, and the content is part of your field.  The creator and narrator is an academic at another United States campus.

There are three episodes so far. 

• The first outlines the series, which sounds quite ambitious, in the scale of a multi-DVD documentary or a very large textbook. 
• The second and third podcasts cover small pieces of the overall topic.  Content quality is top-notch.  Audio quality is pretty good.

 SCENARIO EXERCISE 6

A series of tablet manufacturers are targeting higher education.  Some of the companies are large, others are small; some have worked with academia previously, while some have not.  But what they have in common is bringing a new device to market, and trying to expand that market on campus.

Companies and their machines include:

• Apple, iPad
• Archos, Internet Tablet 5
• Lenovo, Ideapad1
• Microsoft, Courier

To attract us, these companies are offering price discounts.  Indeed, each is trying to undercut the other – looks like a price war.

Questions each group must answer:

1.How did you find out about these developments?

2.How do you decide to use it, help support it, or not use it at all?

3.If you decided to use or support it, how will you pilot or otherwise try out the thing?

4.After you've done piloting or trying it out, or decided not to use it, how will you share what you've learned?

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