Kodachrome no more!

Kodak has just announced that it will retire its Kodachrome color slide film after 74 years. It was done in by the digital media AND PowerPoint. We will miss those beautiful color slides of our family.

But we will not miss those 14 bullet points jammed into one single Kodachrome slide.

In the bad old days when we had to pay some company $3 or $4 for every single slide we need for our presentation, we naturally put as much information as possible on a single slide. It made economic sense then.

But now – thanks to PowerPoint – we can have as many slides as we want and they are all FREE!!! So there is NO need to jam 14 bullet points in a single slide and put the audience in a deep coma.

Remember – one point per slide and lots of pictures.

Multiple speakers in a presentation

Have you ever been to a conference where different speakers give presentations on a single theme? The presentations all relate to the same theme and yet they appear to be totally disjointed and unrelated. Each speaker gives his presentation as if he is the ONLY one talking about the theme at the conference. 

There is no connectivity at all among the various speakers even though they are supposed to be talking about the same general topic.

When I started out in my environmental seminar business, I used to sign up as a guest speaker with a company that conducted 2-day seminars on environmental regulations. This company would invite 6 or 7 speakers (consultants and attorneys) to its seminar and have them speak on areas of their expertise. One person would speak for an hour on the Clean Water Act, another on the Clean Air Act and another one on hazardous waste management, etc.  

Those invited speakers would talk as if the other speakers never existed even though all of these environmental laws are related. They would show up 15 minutes before their own presentation and leave right after it. They had no idea what came before and after them. The end result was a series of totally disjointed and unconnected presentations that was confusing to the audience.

If you want your presentation to stand out or be momorable to the audience, you need to come in early and sit through the presentations of previous speakers so that you can make reference to their talk when it is time to do yours.

You will be amazed how well the audience will receive you.