Sliding into Home Plate: How to Use Slideware to Improve Your Presentation (While Dodging the Bullets)

Abstract

Recently, Microsoft's PowerPoint has come under a series of brutal attacks. Critics have accused the software of promoting simplistic thinking, dumbing down presentations, and constricting interactions between presenter and audience (Schwartz 2003; Parker 2001; Thompson 2003). One detractor went so far as to label PowerPoint “technological cocaine” and another demanded a ban on the software, urging that “Friends Don't Let Friends Use PowerPoint” (Keller 2003; Stewart 2001). The most coherent exposition of PowerPoint's weaknesses has come from Edward Tufte, Yale Professor and visual presentation guru. Tufte (2003) argues that PowerPoint is format—rather than content—or audience-oriented, and thus “turn[s] everything into a sales pitch.” His list of grievances against the software is long. PowerPoint replaces serious analysis with chartjunk, logotypes, and corny clip art. It breaks information into small arbitrary fragments and stacks it chronologically in a manner that inhibits analysis through comparison. It “messes up data with systematic intensity” through bad resolution, thin graphics, and low-information charts. PowerPoint's “inherent defects,” so says Tufte, are “making us stupid, degrading the quality and credibility of our communication, turning us into bores, wasting our colleagues' time.” Ron E. Hassner is assistant professor of political science at the University of California, Berkeley. He remains indebted to Scott D. Sagan for introducing him to both PowerPoint and baseball.