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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.
How do you come from "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'" to "PowerPoint Makes You Dumb"?
.rtf / .pdf (and this story goes right along), but would anyone state that "vi / tex / Acrobat makes you dumb"?
We have seen so much bullshit in plain text / html /
Please, no more...
It's a people problem.
Yes, and it was a "people problem" when ATM's used to pay out the cash before returning your card and people kept laving their cards behind. But sometimes you need to change your software to allow for the "people problems".
TWW
"Encyclopedia" is to "Wikipedia" what "Library" is to "Some people at a bus stop"
A problem I see every day where I work (60k employees organization) is that PP is used for EVERYTHING, not only presentations. In fact, upper management EXPECTS complex issues to be analyzed with a short Power Point document. Anything longer, they just don't read it.
Power Point makes you dumb by giving you the illusion of performing a deep, logical analysis of an issue, when in fact all you're doing is presenting it in a very superficial way.
In IT everyone is happy about presentations and slides and Powerpoint and stuff.
But when *I* dare say, that all this blablabla stuff makes me a worse programmer because I don't like these neverending discussions and planning and opportunities to listen to execs who feel good by pulling their latest crap out their asses in front of me, here at slashdot I get modded down as someone who's unable to think/work in groups.
I, personally, think groupwork is a innovation killer because innovation comes from controversial thinking and controversial thinking is discussed (sometimes with the colourful-buzzy-buzz help of Powerpoint) in groups until it's gone(!)
However, I sence that IT is fucked up by to much talk anyways. And I dare say that this blablabla-buzzy-buzz-talk is already influlencing my comments here. Buzz-IT has eaten me and shitten me out several times.
Thank you?
4) rehearse your presentation so that you know it by heart
I beg to differ. Do NOT learn your presentation by heart. Make sure you understand the subject. Make sure you know it thoroughly. If your slides are good, just interact with them. Show your audience what you're saying (many people like to SEE it). Short strong words are (imho) necessary on a presentation for the audience to keep focus)
There is nothing more boring then a presentation where somebody just rattles on about a subject. PLUS when you are asked a question, you often forget what you were saying. You loose track of your text like that.
If you have no clue what you are saying, then learn it by heart and watch your audience fall asleep.
"So what should we use to make presentations then?"
I tend to use HTML, with big centred titles, and use one of my desktop backgrounds to add some style. It fits easily on a disk, it's easy to add graphics, you've got a full-screen mode on every browser, and when you're done, it can go on a website without making you look like an idiot who uses 150KB graphics to display 10 words.
One thing I notice about lecturers (who actually need to convey information in their slides) is that they tend to use the rolls of acetate, and have "slides" that are several metres long, scrolling down all the time to reveal new information while leaving the last few lines visible for anyone taking notes. You can't do this in Impress, but it's easy enough if you're using HTML.
Scott McNealy's Take on Power Point (it is a PDF document)