It is interesting to see couple of comparisons around the blogosphere with Steve Jobs and other guest speakers’ presentation style in the keynote. To highlight one, Presentation Zen has a great analysis on the presentation and a summary on bloggers’ comments. To summarize his summary, not many people like Stan Sigman’s (CEO of Cingular) speech. In particular, Sigman uses 3×5″ index cards, and awkwardly reading and presenting from it. Did Jobs use any notes? Yes, he actually used them for sections that require less dynamic, but more precision on steps – a product demo. Take a look at Steve’s demo notes, in a close up shot. As Garr at Presentation Zen mentioned the danger of using presentation notes: A take home lesson? Learn and practice your speech, and stop relying on your notes. On the other hand, notes are good if you need to deliver some accurate information, such as a step-by-step demo, so that you won’t miss anything. Just make sure you don’t read it awkwardly. What is your story on presentation? Have you ever delivered a presentation without any notes?
