powerpoint
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You've probably heard the PowerPoint jokes. You know: "Death by PowerPoint," and "power corrupts, but PowerPoint corrupts absolutely." It certainly gets a lot of stick. It also has some surprising defenders.
PowerPoint: Is it Evil? - Visual Thesaurus Online Edition
In my presentations, I may have several slides which feature a quote from a famous (sometimes not so famous) individual in the field. The quote may be a springboard into the topic or serve as support or reinforcement for the particular point I'm making. A typical Tom Peters presentation at one of his seminars, for example, may include dozens of slides with quotes. "I say that my conclusions are much more credible when I back them up with great sources," Tom says in this post from May, 2005. (I talked about using quotes a few months back here with examples.)
Presentation Zen: Where to get quotations for presentations?
Presentation Zen: Where can you find good images?
A lot of people ask me where they can get good-quality images, so I thought it would be good to have one post that I could bookmark and send out to people. I mentioned before that I use iStockphoto.com the most (as well as more expensive sites — though I do that much less now — and high-quality photo discs from Japan). A few people gave links to their favorite free or inexpensive sites as well.
Presentation Zen
In the spirit of personal kaizen , I have listed below a few books that I read (or reread) over the past year that you may want to read as part of your own continuous improvement journey. (Clicking on the book's icon takes you to Amazon.com.) (1) Your Brain at Work: Strategies for Overcoming Distraction, Regaining Focus, and Working Smarter All Day Long .A while ago, I decided to base the book-tour readings from my pseudoreligious tract The New Sins on sales presentations. I was going for a fair dose of irony and satire, and what could be better than using PowerPoint and a projector, the same tools that every sales and marketing person relies on? Having never used the program before, I found it limiting, inflexible, and biased, like most software. On top of that, PowerPoint makes hilariously bad-looking visuals.
Wired 11.09: Learning to Love PowerPoint
Presentation Zen: Contrasts in presentation style: Yoda vs. Dart
Edward Tufte says: " PowerPoint is Evil. " This got me thinking... What if Darth Vader — my favorite fictional bad guy — gave a formal presentation? How would it look? How would it compare to the presentation style of Yoda , the wise Jedi master? In this horribly embellished image above, Darth tries to get Luke to capitulate and join forces by presenting in an "evil PowerPoint style." We know in this galaxy, though, that this approach never really works.
Imagine a widely used and expensive prescription drug that promised to make us beautiful but didn't. Instead the drug had frequent, serious side effects: It induced stupidity, turned everyone into bores, wasted time, and degraded the quality and credibility of communication. These side effects would rightly lead to a worldwide product recall.
Wired 11.09: PowerPoint Is Evil