Apparently PowerPoint presentations are the new thing we love to hate. Even Jeff Bezos, founder of the giant tech firm Amazon.com, has allegedly banned such nuisance from the company meetings.
That’s it: place your bets, because the war on PowerPoint is on!
The anti-PowerPoint movement claims that slide presentations – generally long and dull – constitute a ‘crutch for nervous speakers’ or even turn a once-attentive audience into a ‘robotic crowd reading bullet points rather than listening the speaker’. In Switzerland, the Anti-PowerPoint Party – yes, there actually is such a political party – claims that presentation software ’causes national-economic damage amounting to 2.1 billion Swiss francs [almost AU$3bn], and lowers the quality of a presentation in 95% of the cases’.
Enough, I say. If there is a problem, it is not a software problem. It is a user problem.
A slide presentation can be an effective and efficient way to present your plan and proposals. Used properly, it can be an extremely powerful tool to pitch an idea. Modern luddites should understand that the same rationale to ban PowerPoints in the work environment could be also used to veto emails, text messages and – yes, please! – those extensive, tedious internal meetings. Before long, we are all back to chalk blackboards…
Let’s not demonise the tools for a poor result, but recognise that users are the ultimate culprit. We should be open to new technologies, and their countless spontaneous forces, always remembering who is in charge.
If it is true that sometimes a picture is worth a thousand words, then let the same picture populate the next slide you bump into.
Dr Patrick Carvalho is a Research Fellow at the Centre for Independent Studies – and loves PowerPoint.
Home > Commentary > Opinion > It’s war on PowerPoint!
It’s war on PowerPoint!
That’s it: place your bets, because the war on PowerPoint is on!
The anti-PowerPoint movement claims that slide presentations – generally long and dull – constitute a ‘crutch for nervous speakers’ or even turn a once-attentive audience into a ‘robotic crowd reading bullet points rather than listening the speaker’. In Switzerland, the Anti-PowerPoint Party – yes, there actually is such a political party – claims that presentation software ’causes national-economic damage amounting to 2.1 billion Swiss francs [almost AU$3bn], and lowers the quality of a presentation in 95% of the cases’.
Enough, I say. If there is a problem, it is not a software problem. It is a user problem.
A slide presentation can be an effective and efficient way to present your plan and proposals. Used properly, it can be an extremely powerful tool to pitch an idea. Modern luddites should understand that the same rationale to ban PowerPoints in the work environment could be also used to veto emails, text messages and – yes, please! – those extensive, tedious internal meetings. Before long, we are all back to chalk blackboards…
Let’s not demonise the tools for a poor result, but recognise that users are the ultimate culprit. We should be open to new technologies, and their countless spontaneous forces, always remembering who is in charge.
If it is true that sometimes a picture is worth a thousand words, then let the same picture populate the next slide you bump into.
Dr Patrick Carvalho is a Research Fellow at the Centre for Independent Studies – and loves PowerPoint.
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