CS 4002
Robots in Society
Term Project, Assignment #2
Due: THURSDAY, March 6 2008 IN CLASS

Requirements:

As you recall, your individual term project is to research an issue about which you are initially undecided. Your final assignment for the course will be an argument in which you take a stand on this issue.

For this assignment, you are to write an outline of your project. The outline is an outline of your approach not an outline of the final paper (in other words, subsections will be topical, as opposed to the subheadings of your paper, which are likely to be very uncertain right now). Deal explicitly with:

· Topic and final wording of the issue/question you are investigating.

· Description of your approach. What are the sub-issues that you need to explore or the positions/facts that you need to describe in detail. For example, if you are writing about robotic toys with affect, you may need to give a chronological account of the development of such toys: when the first robotic toy became available, it's cost, how they have changed, what the market penetration has been or is projected to be and perhaps how the toy market has changed over the last decade (BTW, the toy market has changed dramatically since the mid-1980s: three year olds demand toys by name and the once-lucrative eight-year old toy market has all but vanished). What have you discovered so far about the topic? How has the scope of your project changed (if at all)? What are you realizing you don't know enough about that you will have to go and research? Please pay attention to likely obstacles and difficulties.

· Resources. Describe in detail the resources that you are using or plan to use. These may include documents, individuals (if you are using interviews or in-depth advice from other faculty), organization websites, laws, regulations and policies, as well as published papers and books. For some of your resources, you may have no details yet, so there is no need to give a formal bibliography at this stage; however, you should be able to frame your requirements. For example: "I really need to find a book about the European perspective on left-handed mice." or "Is there someone in Chemical Engineering who can help me evaluate the dangers of robotic paint mixers in hardware stores?"

I have a hard time believing you can do this in signficantly less than about a page, but I'd like you to certainly do it in less than two.

Turning this in:

Please email me (zkira@cc) your assignment with the subject "CS4002 tp#2: Your title or topic". If you are going to email it from an account other than your gt account, please include your gt account in the body as well.

Grading & Warning:

As with term assignment #1, this assignment is a part of your term project. This will contribute 15 percent of the term project grade. You will be dinged for poor grammar and/or spelling (because it is painful to have to read that sort of thing) as well as for turning in something half-done and/or lame. Try to avoid doing any of that.