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Microsoft's PowerPoint and Corel's Presentations are examples of presentation software. Most commonly, they are used to make what shows on the screen during an oral presentation.
You learned this in kindergarten as show and tell. Over the years, you've seen thousands of hours of professional presentations on TV and video. You've suffered through or enjoyed many presentations at school and at meetings on the job and in your community.
As an audience member, you have a good idea what works for you and what doesn't. What about as a presenter? How do you compete with the expectations for entertainment created by TV?
One of your decisions is what tool you use to supplement a presentation: PowerPoint slides or Web pages?
On the one hand, presentations can easily be delivered over a distributed network. In fact, Microsoft and Corel now let you save the slides as images embedded in web pages. They don't retain the activity and other effects, but they're readable.
On the other hand, you can use a series of web pages to supplement a presentation instead of PowerPoint slides.
Then you can start thinking about your presentations as theater. Treat it like a theater production. You're the producer, director, actor, and script writer as well as the set, costume, and lighting designer.
hard to hear and understand <----> loud and clearly enunciated
inappropriate clothes <----> appropriate business clothes
negative expressions and postures <----> positive expressions and postures
default staging: dark, hard to read <----> well-staged: lighting, positioning
clumsy use of technology <----> unobtrusive use of technology
no attempt to break fourth wall <----> effective breaking, especially with humor
Let's try to separate them as far as possible.
A PowerPoint presentation is designed to supplement a presentation. The presenter, not the program, answers an oral question.
A web site is meant to exist independently from the presenter's control. It can be controlled by the presenter during the presentation and by each audience member thereafter. The page responds to events initiated at the users' discretion.
Presentations exist in time. While the presenter can jump around the slide list to adapt to an audience, every member of the audience sees the same slides in the same order. In fact, most presentations go in the pre-set order whether or not that might be the most effective order for a particular audience member.
Webs exist in space. While a well-designed sales web makes it easy to move toward a sale, it still allows for many paths to get there. The presenter can adapt to the audience on the fly.
Presentations are digitized old media. People in groups view PowerPoint slides as reflected light, often from a considerable distance. The room light can make all the difference, so the presenter is sometimes in the dark.
Webs are new media. Individual people view them as emitted light, often from only a foot or two away. The presenter can stay in the light.
Think of a PowerPoint slide as a billboard. It is best for bold graphics and activity such as embedded video and sound clips. At its high end, PowerPoint can look much like a movie made with Adobe's Premiere.
At its worst, a PowerPoint presentation has cut-and-paste text from a report as on the screen shot below. Inexperienced and unimaginative presenters stand next to this slide and read the text. They may or may not have taken the gum out of their mouths first.
The audience goes cross-eyed. Then they start yawning. As a student, your learning curve flattens or dips.
Web pages are better for detailed graphics and for text. Also Web pages can be interactive by including forms, for example.
During a PowerPoint presentation, one person controls the sequence and pace. Audience members rarely interrupt to say, "You're going too slow." It's even harder for an audience member to say, "You're going too fast." What if the others don't feel that way? It's better to keep quiet and endure. At an early age, we learn to feign interest in such situations. It's called politeness. Our minds may be miles away. Many presenters are counting on that because their minds are miles away, too.
When exploring a web, the individual user holds the clicker and controls the sequence and pace.
The interesting hybrid is making a presentation in a room where everyone except the presenter has a mouse and an open Web connection.
From what I hear, control is the single biggest issue for traditional presenters such as academic lecturers. It's a premise they don't question. Maybe it's about time.
A PowerPoint slides are small; they are as high as one screen. Web pages are as long as you want them to be.
PowerPoint slides use the proprietary .ppt file format that Microsoft doesn't share. Web pages use the open, free .htm text file format along with compressed graphics whose formats are also open and free. As a result, Web pages are smaller by up to two orders of magnitude. A 10 K .htm file and a half dozen 5 K images can easily turn into a 5,000 K (5 M) .ppt file.
PowerPoint is best for live presentations to large groups, for storyboards, and for brainstorming. It is good for small quantities of information and specific purposes that lend themselves to a pre-set linear order.
The Web is best for large quantities of information and a broad range of human communication from file sharing to videoconferencing and shared whiteboards.
When it is expected or required or the only option.
When should you use Web pages? The rest of the time.
Mounting
Presentations on the Web: Presentation Software, HTML, or Both?
by Steven J. Bell
ONLINE, September 1998
the Toolkit's Business Media presentation software section
Their site, divided into Creating, Delivering, and Technology, is developing into a good one-stop shop. Check out one of the current featured articles called "Meet your future: 13 ways presenting will change".
Their February 2000 cover story has an interesting history of the development of PowerPoint.
This site provides step-by-step instructions for preparing and delivering a speech. The site helps you select and research a topic, outline your points, and deliver a speech like a pro.
InFocus, a company that sells projectors, has a terrific list of links to free stuff to help you make better presentations.
The Courses area will lead you to a lot of good advice. The Multimedia Center will lead you to templates and clip art.
The Meeting Network's Reading Room - Articles and Advice
Home of Screen Beans and full of PowerPoint tips.
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