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PowerPoint Makes You Dumb
jpatokal writes "The New York Times confirms what we've suspected all along: PowerPoint makes you dumb. In a new essay, information theorist Edward Tufte outlines why PowerPoint 'forces people to mutilate data beyond comprehension.' The Columbia Accident Investigation Board at NASA agrees, noting that the slides produced by engineers to report on the wing damage were so confusing that 'a senior manager might read this PowerPoint slide and not realize that it addresses a life-threatening situation.'" Tufte's essay (and the shuttle/PowerPoint critique) has been available for sale since earlier this year, but the NYT article gives a greater sampling of its content than Tufte's website does.
In a new essay, information theorist Edward Tufte outlines why PowerPoint 'forces people to mutilate data beyond comprehension.' The Columbia Accident Investigation Board at NASA agrees, noting that the slides produced by engineers to report on the wing damage were so confusing that 'a senior manager might read this PowerPoint slide and not realize that it addresses a life-threatening situation.
Correct me if I'm wrong, but powerpoint doesn't have a wizard that says "it looks like you're trying to insert text saying `life threatening situation' in size 44 text, would you like to Dilbertize this slide?".
I worked in a print shop a few years ago, and people would bring in large .ppt documents to print
.ppt slide to be printed as a poster.
not as slides, mind, but they'd laid out BOOKS in powerpoint. Yes, blue shaded background in landscape mode and all, with large yellow text, they'd write a small booklet in powerpoint and come to us to have it printed in a professional looking booklet.
Of course they didn't want it to look like it did onscreen, they wanted it to look like any other novels.
Upper management were the worst, when they worked on something themselves, and would bring in a
An embedded 72dpi powerpoint image does NOT scale up well at all to an A1 poster.
All other app users, from Quark XPress, pagemaker, acrobat, word, whatever... they knew what to expect and how to (generally) lay out a document, and when we'd have to do adjustments, they'd be relatively minor, but powerpoint people were bottom of the barrel.
Except for the guy who laid out all his print jobs in Frontpage. I think he was on acid.
Part of Whole
Proper Use
Wrapup
I think I've made myself clear.
Best. Comment. Ever. Enjoy!
English speakers should stick to short Anglo-Saxon words. You can't always avoid Latin and French words, but try to use the Anglo-Saxon vocabulary where you can.
That's very good advice.
Er... sorry, I shouldn't have used "advice" (via French from Latin "ad visere")... let's rephrase that to "your words are wise." Whoops, I said "rephrase" (re + phrase, via Latin from Greek "phrasis"), that should be "let's use a different word". Oh, but "different" is from Latin "differre". An alternative... nope, Latin again... aha, I think "another" is okay. "Let's use another word".
Damn, this is difficul-- um, hard, isn't it? Blast, I forgot, "damn" is from Latin too!
By the way, I would like to draw attentio-- sorry, to point out that your use of the word "vocabulary" is not a good choice. The Anglo-Saxon term is "word-hoard", which I think you'll agree[1] is much clearer[2].
[1] Agree: from Old French "agreer"
[2] Clear: from Latin "clarus" via Old French "cler".