Over and over again I hear or read that people hate PowerPoint presentations. I have been at conferences where the coolest speaker, is the one that throws away his PowerPoint presentation and instead use Notepad. (I don't personally remember a thing of what he said.) On the other hand I have seen many presentations, where the slides are just the speaker's notes.
I think that PowerPoint has the same effect as a desktop publishing program has for the lay people. Its fun and it's easy and he tries to squeeze in everything everywhere. None of us would disagree with me when I said that DTP has changed the world to the better. (You now, the free speech and that kind of things.) And this could be the same thing with PowerPoint. It is a tool and you could use or misuse it in the same way as a DTP or, why not, a knife.
Here is an argument between two gents about this. It is interesting to read, especially the latter part where they give techniques for making a PowerPoint presentation work (and not be boring).
You can't really talk about PowerPoint nowdays and not mention Edward Tufte.
The Cognitive Style of Powerpoint
http://www.edwardtufte.com/tufte/books_pp
Wired 11.09: PowerPoint Is Evil
http://www.wired.com/wired/archive/11.09/ppt2.html
Posted by: Peter Östergren | 2004-11-12 at 01.25
A presentation is made up with 4 different tools.
The PPT-slides, the content, the language and the voice. If you are missusing any part, you can't just blame it on Power Point.
1. Slides should not be the copy of your speach
2. Slides should not be to messy with a lot of text and different fonts and styles.
3. Use pictures and leading words and have a relaxed approach to your slides.
4. Prepare your slides so you easyly can return to certain highlights.
5. Be prepared and don't try to open already open doors. We will all fall to sleep.
Peter
Posted by: PPT one part of the tool | 2005-01-15 at 17.50