“Its astonishing popularity, the way it has spread exponentially through the culture, seems analogous, in a way, to drugs. Think of it as technological cocaine – so effortless to embrace initially, so difficult to relinquish after that. People who once use PowerPoint generally don’t stop using it. People who don’t use it can’t quite understand what all the fuss is about. And then they use it. And neither they nor their relationship to information is ever quite the same again.”
Julia Keller, in the Chicago Tribune (via Arts & Letters Daily). This could have been a cheap-shot, trite, clichéd piece, but the sheer length and detail of its exploration of the PowerPoint phenomenon makes for compelling reading.
Technological Cocaine
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Have to say I agree with many of the ‘points’ raised here (sorry). Having been regularly PowerPoint’d, I especially liked her “illiterate backwoodsmen” comment.
Personally I’m not fond of it, mainly because it is too rigid and doesn’t suit my way of thinking, and yes I would worry that it could stifle younger minds (and now I feel old…)