Design Better PowerPoint

Posted: 28 Jun 2010 07:39 PM PDT

In my line of work, I find myself constantly producing PowerPoint presentations. Sometimes these are individual slides (like a diagram or case study), sometimes they are templates, & sometimes they are whole, individual presentations. Most of my PowerPoint work is done at my day job where I am an in-house designer, but my freelancing adjust ego occasionally comes across a client needing some presentational pickup. Over the years, I have built & edited hundreds of PowerPoint files.

I do know lots of people think PowerPoint is the devil incarnate, but in the corporate world, it is an ubiquitous wicked. To shake a quantity of the negative stereotypes, I apply traditional design principals to make my company & clients look better than the competition.
They go to 120 trade shows a year, & they present at every single one. They also use Macromedia's Breeze for hundreds of online demos. Our PowerPoint is often the first thing a feasible customer will see from us, so it is critical (& simple) to make a lovely impression before they even get a brochure.
PowerPoint is used by sales man on the planet, with a whole industry of accessories built around the presentation guru / road warrior idea. It is employed for downloadable or live web demos, & it is even used (or abused, depending on your point of view) to pass along copy, ideas & notes between internal team members. With this volume of use, PowerPoint slide design becomes another facet of a company's identity program.
From Chuck's Neighborhood PeeCee Warehouse to Apple Computer, the local cafe with the brilliant bagels to Starbucks Coffee, every business benefits from a unique identity, a glance & feel that separates them from competition. The company logo is only a tiny part. Corporate colors, type treatments, illustration styles & repeated graphic elements are all parts of the greater whole. This identity is carried through to stationary, trade show graphics, packaging, marketing & yes, PowerPoint.
The application has become so ubiquitous that I think about it part of a greater paradigm shift in mainstream communication. The only issue is that this evolution is delaying communication. Like text messaging or 200-pixel banner ads, the information is compressed to a set of key buzzwords, crippling the message by stripping the skeleton of any meat. Bullet points become rapid-fire metadata. I give you the words "purple" & "fish" -- you figure out what I am trying to say.
* Leverage your existing expertise
* Recognize fast ROI
* Streamlined implementation
Is about as significant as:
* Parsed cabbage flux capacitor
* Disco glitter manifestation
* Expressive giraffe BLT
Perhaps a hundred years ago those phrases denoted something, but by sheer repetition & abuse, the PowerPoint generation has crushed the meaning like 200,000 people at a Stones concert trampling through a flower garden.
In the same way a lovely logo supports a successful identity program, lovely PowerPoint transcends half-assed bullet points & reinforces the speaker -- their character, message & purpose. It doesn't recycle the same, worn out messaging over & over. Not only does it look awesome, lovely PowerPoint hammers home the presenter's message with unique phrasing, fascinating design elements & a sure disregard for the established order bullshit buzz-speak.
All the flashy backgrounds, painstaking animations & intense clipart research are for nothing if the message has been gutted from the shell. So while I "design" PowerPoint, I design for the audience because I am focused on how they will react to the information.

Multimedia Job and Internships Links (Innovative Interactivity)

Interactive Multimedia Technology

Multimedia Job and Internships Links (Innovative Interactivity)

Multimedia Job and Internships Links (Innovative Interactivity)
Slow Media Manifesto (a link from Nat Torkington of O'Reilly Radar)
NVDIA Press Release: Stereoscopic 3D Video Streamed over Internet

Posted: 29 Jun 2010 03:08 AM PDT

If you are interested in looking for a job or an internship involving multimedia, take a look at the 20 opportunities highlighted on the Interactive Interactivity blog. This list is featured monthly.

Job and internship opportunities, July 2010

Slow Media Manifesto (a link from Nat Torkington of O'Reilly Radar)

Posted: 29 Jun 2010 03:12 AM PDT

Slow Media Manifesto

"In the second decade, people will not search for new technologies allowing for even easier, faster and low-priced content production. Rather, appropriate reactions to this media revolution are to be developed and integrated politically, culturally and socially. The concept "Slow", as in "Slow Food" and not as in "Slow Down", is a key for this. Like "Slow Food", Slow Media are not about fast consumption but about choosing the ingredients mindfully and preparing them in a concentrated manner. Slow Media are welcoming and hospitable. They like to share." -Slow Media Manifesto

I especially liked #5 of the Slow Media Manifesto:

"5. Slow Media advance Prosumers, i.e. people who actively define what and how they want to consume and produce. In Slow Media, the active Prosumer, inspired by his media usage to develop new ideas and take action, replaces the passive consumer. This may be shown by marginals in a book or animated discussion about a record with friends. Slow Media inspire, continuously affect the users' thoughts and actions and are still perceptible years later. "

Slow Media Blog

RELATED
Slow Media
Beyond the Beyond: The Slow Media Manifesto
Bruce Sterling, Wired 6/28/10
Apres les slow food, les slow media?
Nouvo, 6/25/10
La manifeste des slow media (tradution: fr)

NVDIA Press Release: Stereoscopic 3D Video Streamed over Internet

Posted: 28 Jun 2010 10:44 AM PDT

I'm putting together information for my next post about the evolution of 3D technologies and thought I'd go ahead and share this press release about 3D video streaming. I'd love to see this in action!

The beauty of this news is that NVIDIA has worked in collaboration with Microsoft to develop streaming content using Silverlight and IIS Smooth Streaming so people can watch stereoscopic 3D content from their PC's.

COMPUTEX 2010—TAIPEI—May 31, 2010—NVIDIA today demonstrated 3D video streamed live over the Internet using an NVIDIA® 3D VisionTM PC, Microsoft Silverlight and IIS Smooth Streaming technology. The demonstration, which streamed the music video "We Are the World" 3D, at a press conference at Computex, comes at a time when consumer interest in seeing 3D movies is at its highest level ever.

"We've been collaborating with Microsoft to enable 3D in an Internet browser so that it's very simple to use," said Phil Eisler, General Manager of 3D Vision technology at NVIDIA. "Just click on a 3D video and it plays in 3D, using the latest 3D Vision Silverlight-based video player and NVIDIA 3D Vision. Internet users can now enjoy 3D video content streamed in high-definition (HD) quality and viewed at full resolution. This is another great benefit of having a 3D PC."

To take advantage of this technology, consumers will need an NVIDIA 3D Vision-based desktop or notebook PC equipped with the latest 3D Vision drivers and the Silverlight browser plug-in. Once these are installed, consumers can then navigate to any Web site hosting 3D Vision-based content.

For content owners, this milestone provides a secure path to distribute and monetize 3D video over the Web with Silverlight and IIS Smooth Streaming. Movies, trailers, sports and any form of 3D video can now be hosted and streamed over the Internet to a growing market of 3D PCs, most of which ship with Windows 7.

"Customers have a peaked interest in 3D entertainment experiences, and Microsoft is looking forward to working with NVIDIA to bring these experiences to users through their PCs," said Scott Guthrie, corporate vice president of the .NET Developer Division at Microsoft Corp. "Silverlight and IIS Smooth Streaming together deliver the highest quality HD video experiences over the Web and, with NVIDIA 3D Vision, will now provide consumers with a way to watch their favorite movies, sporting events, music videos and more, all in 3D from their own computer."

For more information on how to use and install 3D streaming capabilities on 3D Vision PCs visit http://www.nvidia.com/get3D

Useful Links: 
http://www.nvidia.com/3DPC  
http://www.nvidia.com/get3D  
http://www.microsoft.com/silverlight

For further information, contact:
Bryan Del Rizzo
NVIDIA Corporation
(408) 486-2772
bdelrizzo@nvidia.com

The Small Print
About NVIDIA
 NVIDIA (NASDAQ: NVDA) awakened the world to the power of computer graphics when it invented the GPU in 1999. Since then, it has consistently set new standards in visual computing with breathtaking, interactive graphics available on devices ranging from tablets and portable media players to notebooks and workstations. NVIDIA's expertise in programmable GPUs has led to breakthroughs in parallel processing which make supercomputing inexpensive and widely accessible. The company holds more than 1,100 U.S. patents, including ones covering designs and insights which are fundamental to modern computing. For more information, see www.nvidia.com.
Certain statements in this press release including, but not limited to, statements as to: the benefits, features, impact and capabilities of 3D PC hardware and software, are forward-looking statements that are subject to risks and uncertainties that could cause results to be materially different than expectations. Important factors that could cause actual results to differ materially include: our reliance on third parties to manufacture, assemble, package and test our products; global economic conditions; development of more efficient or faster technology; design, manufacturing or software defects; the impact of technological development and competition; changes in consumer preferences and demands; customer adoption of different standards or our competitor's products; changes in industry standards and interfaces; unexpected loss of performance of our products or technologies when integrated into systems as well as other factors detailed from time to time in the reports NVIDIA files with the Securities and Exchange Commission including its Form 10-Q for the fiscal period ended May 2, 2010. Copies of reports filed with the SEC are posted on NVIDIA's website and are available from NVIDIA without charge. These forward-looking statements are not guarantees of future performance and speak only as of the date hereof, and, except as required by law, NVIDIA disclaims any obligation to update these forward-looking statements to reflect future events or circumstances.
# # #
© 2010 NVIDIA Corporation. All rights reserved. NVIDIA and 3D Vision are trademarks and/or registered trademarks of NVIDIA Corporation in the U.S. and other countries. Other company and product names may be trademarks of the respective companies with which they are associated. Features, pricing, availability, and specifications are subject to change without notice.

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Copyright© 2010 NVIDIA Corporation. All rights reserved. All company and/or product names may be trade names, trademarks, and/or registered trademarks of the respective owners with which they are associated. Features, pricing, availability, and specifications are subject to change without notice.

Note to editors: If you are interested in viewing additional information on NVIDIA, please visit the NVIDIA Press Room at http://www.nvidia.com/page/press_room.html

See actual location of shortened URLs - Avoid malicious short links

Posted: 29 Jun 2010 12:20 AM PDT

Now a days we are handling so many shortened URL's in emails, websites, social networking sites like Twitter or Facebook etc. If the origin of the shortened URLs is from a trusted source, you don't need to worry about it. What if you are getting an invitation to click on the shortened URL from an unknown source ? How can we know the actual location which pointing the shortened link ? It is not advised to click on a shortened URL without knowing the full URL. Here I am introducing one Firefox Addon which can show the full URL without click on the tiny link.

Check on of my tweet with a shortened URL.

[Actual URL is

http://www.corenetworkz.com/2010/06/capture-full-screen-shot-using-firefox.html and the shortened URL is :

http://bit.ly/9n5eSR ]

See my actual Tweet in chrome where no long URL pluggin installed.