In Mid-September, a public dialogue event initiated and organised by a SYNENERGENE mini consortium took place in Karlsruhe. By putting it into the wider context of the history of technology, the moderator introduced synthetic biology as an ambivalent innovation. In the same vein, and based on interviews with citizens, the short introductory trailer documented that laypeople are highly ambivalent about the benefits and the ethical challenges raised by synthetic biology. Maybe synthetic biology really represents a promising research field – but are there any useful applications at all to be expected in the near future?