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Why PowerPoint should be banned

washingtonpost.com

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Re: Why PowerPoint should be banned

#91

Post by ksk »

coldtea wrote: post #44
venganesan wrote: post #9

This is like saying food makes us fat, ban food! Nonsensical

If we're to use logic, how about use it properly? For one, food is essential for our survival. Powerpoint is not. So while banning food would be nonsensical (for that reason), banning Powerpoint doesn't have the same issue. A better example would be: "French fries make us fat, ban french fries". Not as nonsensical. French fries are not essential to eat in the first place, and cause harm according to most studies.

>For one, food is essential for our survival.

The analogy isn't based on 'essentiality'. The point that was made, was correct - Banning something does not solve the original problem. Sorry for spelling it out. I didn't realize comprehending it would be so troublesome for some.

There is no such thing as a perfect analogy. If an analogy can't break down, it wouldn't be called an analogy. You would just say the thing that was to be said.

Re: Why PowerPoint should be banned

#93

Post by Shivetya »

Sadly those NSA/Etc horrid presentations could just as well come from where I work. Having been asked about them before I simply replied, "wall of text" and you guys did a great job of not getting to the point. See, they don't ascribe to that rule of no more than three to five bullet points per slide. I have seen Excel Spreadsheets embedded in slides.

I think Powerpoint serves two very important purposes. In the hands of good management it conveys what is important and how it will be addressed. In the hands of bad management it clearly shows their lack of focus reinforced in slide form. (of course a 68 question survey on what you like and don't like about work wasn't a damn clue)

Re: Why PowerPoint should be banned

#94

Post by apalmer »

There is neither anything inherently wrong with PowerPoint, and even more 'controversially' there is nothing inherently wrong with information dense slides. Especially in the case where it includes complex graphics such as maps and charts as shown here.

The small information limited bullet point laid out form of presentation is derived from marketing/persuasive presentations. In that context then yes the narrative should drive the discussion, and slides should just reinforce the 'take away' points. These slides should be light for the same reason Elevator Pitches should be less than 2 minutes.

However other presentations such as some of the ones shown in the article are not intended to persuade but intended to share dense information. For instance saying that the military should not put dense maps in presentations intended for brass who have to visualize the geographic layout based on the presentation is pretty clueless.

Its a tool, not everyone is using it to accomplish the same goals as the author is. Truth is 99% of times the marketing format of presentations is the way to go, but it is not 100% of the time.

Re: Why PowerPoint should be banned

#96

Post by collyw »

bhartzer wrote: post #55
Someone1234 wrote: post #33

Even if you did ban PowerPoint, people would just find a way to do PP-like things with something else. For example, MS Word, with the page down key (although then the transition animations go away, so that is a minor victory). In my opinion, people are just poorly educated (or not educated) in presentation making. Or to phase it another way, a school may teach them to use PP the software but doesn't teach them how to…

The worst is when people don't/can't/won't use PowerPoint and they use MS Word or a PDF to create "slides". I don't think PowerPoint should be banned, just the misuse of PPT should be banned.

So that includes the vast majority of people who don't/can't/won't use it well.

Re: Why PowerPoint should be banned

#98

Post by giltleaf »

Title should be: Ban people like Katrin Park and untrained gov bureaucrats from using power point.

Just because people don't know how to use something doesn't mean it should be banned, or even that it's negative. Especially when her "challenging the hegemony" point is 'use Prezi."

Re: Why PowerPoint should be banned

#99

Post by drzaiusapelord »

Someone1234 wrote: post #33

Even if you did ban PowerPoint, people would just find a way to do PP-like things with something else. For example, MS Word, with the page down key (although then the transition animations go away, so that is a minor victory). In my opinion, people are just poorly educated (or not educated) in presentation making. Or to phase it another way, a school may teach them to use PP the software but doesn't teach them how to…

PP exists to replace the bulleted memo or prop stand poster, which have existed for god knows how long in corporate culture. Most PP complaints seem to be about broken meeting "culture" than PP itself. Most meetings are about self-promotion, bureaucracy, etc than productivity. Changing the tools won't matter. If the boss expects a weekly meeting from your department, then it will continue to happen and will probably happen with PP, especially if the boss uses PP.

Re: Why PowerPoint should be banned

#100

Post by dangoor »

lqdc13 wrote: post #65
Someone1234 wrote: post #33

Even if you did ban PowerPoint, people would just find a way to do PP-like things with something else. For example, MS Word, with the page down key (although then the transition animations go away, so that is a minor victory). In my opinion, people are just poorly educated (or not educated) in presentation making. Or to phase it another way, a school may teach them to use PP the software but doesn't teach them how to…

I really like when people put a lot of information on the slides. It makes going over past presentations very easy. For example, when a new ML algorithm comes out, the only way to easily grasp how it works without reading a bunch of papers is to find some Power Point slides by the author. I guarantee people wouldn't make two sets of slides either.

Documents and presentation visuals should be two different things, ideally.

There is the notion of a Slidedoc:

http://www.duarte.com/slidedocs/

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