prezi?

One more bit on presentations from yesterday's piece. A friend of mine told me about a presentation tool she recently used called Prezi, which fancies itself as the "the zooming presentation editor". Go take a look which I have had only moderate success doing through the small tubes of the internet here, but I have checked out their intro video on YouTube. It is evidently possible to use this tool incorrectly (or perhaps awesomely!) to induce nausea in the more sensitive members of your audience. Judging by their intro video, I can certainly see how that is possible if one were overzealous with the zooming and panning and general level of motion. Instead of the boring, "Game-changing presentations online" bit, maybe they can consider "Prezi, the Vomit Comet of presentation tools!"

All teasing aside, tools like this can significantly help with the display of information, particularly complex ideas or data, but the core focus of what a presentation is about should still be the speaker. The speaker controls the tempo and flow of a presentation and is the one to lead the audience through his or her story. A gifted presenter needs nothing more than themselves. A novice presenter is not helped by even the best presentation tools.