"Despite the level of cadet complaints about the 'Death by
PowerPoint’ phenomena, I have found that they (cadets) are quite
willing to inflict this upon their colleagues."
- LTC J.B. USMA Faculty
"PowerPoint presentations are a new form of anesthesia and torture. They were even used at the Abu Ghraib Prison."
- Anonymous
"His knowledge on that topic is only PowerPoint deep."
- MAJ (JS)
"PPT is a triumph of process over product. Knowing what you are doing is more important than getting the right answer."
- Tom Lehrer
"I recently exchanged comments with someone on a similar
briefing (earlier version?). I told him that Power Point briefings do
nothing but obfuscate. If you cannot explain what you are doing in
three pages of text, you are BSing. That's what the slide show is: BS."
- Senior Army Officer
"The genius of it is that it was designed for any idiot to use. I learned it in a few hours."
- David Byrne formerly of the Talking Heads
"Power corrupts and PowerPoint corrupts absolutely."
- Vint Cerf Internet pioneer
"My belief is that PowerPoint doesn't kill meetings. People kill meetings."
- Peter Norvig Google, Inc.
"Using PowerPoint is like having a loaded AK-47 on the table: You can do very bad things with it."
- Peter Norvig
"If your words or images are not on point, making them dance in color won't make them relevant."
- Edward Tufte Professor Emeritus, Yale University
"PowerPoint presentations too often resemble a school play - very loud, very slow, and very simple."
- Edward Tufte
"PowerPoint is designed for making a slide show a little more
attractive with images and text that move, but when an idiot makes them
all move, interest is lost."
- Anonymous
"You can't speak with the U.S. military without knowing PowerPoint."
- Margaret Hayes National Defense University
"Shelton's order is only the Pentagon's most recent assault on a growing electronic menace: the PowerPoint briefing."
- Anonymous
"The idea behind most of these briefings is for us to sit
through 100 slides with our eyes glazed over, and then to do what all
military organizations hope for ... to surrender to an overwhelming
mass."
- Richard Danzig Navy Secretary
"Navy Secretary Danzig announced late last year that he was
no longer willing to soldier through the slide shows. He maintains that
PowerPoint briefings are only necessary for two reasons: If field
conditions are changing rapidly or if the audience is 'functionally
illiterate.'"
- Anonymous
"The PowerPoint syndrome isn’t just the misuse of specific technology. It’s a cultural disease."
- Giancarlo Livraghi
"We had 12.9 gigabytes of (Microsoft) PowerPoint slides on
our network. And I thought, 'What a huge waste of corporate
productivity.' So we banned it. And we've had three unbelievable
record-breaking fiscal quarters since we banned PowerPoint. Now, I
would argue that every company in the world, if they would just ban
PowerPoint, would see their earnings skyrocket. Employees would stand
around going, 'What do I do? Guess I've got to go to work.'"
- Scott McNealy Sun Microsystems, quoted in the San Jose Mercury News, January 27, 1997
"Funny. I always thought that PowerPoint was already at
least as destructive as macro viruses to corporate productivity. You
ever watch a suit fiddle with his presentation?"
- CmdrTaco
"One of the criticisms that's been raised ab |