Presentation Zen: a book dedicates to speakers

This summer, during my flights, I decide to read a book dedicate on how to create AMAZING presentation, so I buy Presentation Zen and in 10 hours more or less I finish it and… WOW, it opens my mind!

Author approach is very simple and start his book saying: “Remember that are only suggestions, this book is not a bible that teach you how to use Powerpoint or Keynote, but it shows you how to approach a real presentation process”.

In fact, if you read the book, you don’t learn how to prepare great slides with slideware (it’s a fantastic term to define presentation’s softwares like Powerpoint or Keynote) but you’ll learn what you MUST think behind a slide… out of your computers world.

Few things that I learn reading Presentation Zen:

  • Avoid bullets list (like this :P )
  • Think about the message before switch on your computer and, if you can, go away from your computer with a pen or pencil and paper, tons of papers
  • You must focus your presentation in ONE MESSAGE and follow it during your slides creation
  • An image is better of 1 thousand of words
  • Presentation must help you during your speech and not substitute you
  • Less is better

There are tons of concepts that can help any kind of speakers from IT world to Yoga teachers (I suppose).

I think could be so interesting for anyone that usually speech for passion in conferences or for everyone that make presentation for work like CEO, marketing people and so on.
If you are interesting to buy this book or give more informations about it, go to author’s blog.

Why AIR is called AIR? my crazy idea

Yesterday morning when I came back from an AS3 course in Venice, when I was in my car (it was too hot!), I started to think why AIR was called AIR (I know I’m totally crazy!).
So, feel free to follow me in this mind trip:

1. There aren’t any kind of Adobe software where in own name there is “Adobe” word, in fact we talk about Adobe Photoshop, Adobe Flash, Adobe AIR, but if you read in long version Adobe AIR you’ll read Adobe Adobe Integrated Runtime… bad sound!

2. AIR is a technology that allow you to bring your web contents and put on user’s desktop to create an “offline software”.
In 1996 Macromedia published a whitepaper where, for the first time, they talked about RIA (Rich Internet Application), so a kind of online software.

So AIR is the opposite of a RIA (one works online the other one mainly offline) and if you reverse the word R I A, you can find A I R!!!

I think that, after called this technology AIR, they think about the real acronym and marketing strategy.

I know, I’m crazy… but it’s funny… isn’t it?! :D