Sunday, September 18, 2005
PowerPoint as a Tattoo...
Twenty years ago, we didn't see many tattoos in polite society. Today, I can't help but notice the mass proliferation of tattoos on the bodies of (mostly) young people.
Some of these tattoos are quite creative, personal objects of art or a statement of conviction. But most simply scream "I wanna fit in, look cool, rebel for the sake of rebelling."
Tattoos communicate visually and personally, and so can PowerPoint. So why don't we see more charts and graphs, or lists of bullet points tattooed on our arms? Could it be that a long list of bullet points just isn't that visually compelling?!
Think about that the next time you create a PowerPoint presentation. Is it a PowerPoint presentation that wants to fit in with all the other presentations? Iis it a presentation that wants to be different for the sake of being different? How does it effectively communicate your convictions?
Thinking about the tattoo makes me want to use it as a visual metaphor in my next business presentation. Every slide should be reminiscent of a tattoo: a brief visual, maybe one or two words of text. That's it.
I'm not talking about showing skin here! I'm talking about every PowerPoint slide being a virtual tattoo. Tattoos communicate visually and personally, and so can PowerPoint. Why not? ¶ 9/18/2005 05:39:00 PM
Twenty years ago, we didn't see many tattoos in polite society. Today, I can't help but notice the mass proliferation of tattoos on the bodies of (mostly) young people.Some of these tattoos are quite creative, personal objects of art or a statement of conviction. But most simply scream "I wanna fit in, look cool, rebel for the sake of rebelling."
Tattoos communicate visually and personally, and so can PowerPoint. So why don't we see more charts and graphs, or lists of bullet points tattooed on our arms? Could it be that a long list of bullet points just isn't that visually compelling?!
Think about that the next time you create a PowerPoint presentation. Is it a PowerPoint presentation that wants to fit in with all the other presentations? Iis it a presentation that wants to be different for the sake of being different? How does it effectively communicate your convictions?
Thinking about the tattoo makes me want to use it as a visual metaphor in my next business presentation. Every slide should be reminiscent of a tattoo: a brief visual, maybe one or two words of text. That's it.
I'm not talking about showing skin here! I'm talking about every PowerPoint slide being a virtual tattoo. Tattoos communicate visually and personally, and so can PowerPoint. Why not? ¶ 9/18/2005 05:39:00 PM
