How To Give A Bad Talk

1
How To Give A Bad Talk
Based on a paper by David A Patterson Computer
Science Division University of California-Berkeley
Circa 1983
2
Dont Be Neat Organised

• Why waste time preparing?
• Ignore speling, Grand Ma and legibility
• Who cares what 20 people think?

3
Dont Waste Space

• Crowd items together

• Fewer slides means a faster presentation
• Transparencies are expensive!
• Projected saving
• 5 slides x 4 talks/year

Who cares if people cant read everything youve
writtenIf it was really important to them they
would try harder.
7 saved per year!
4
Always Give Full Details

• Never use keywords as memory joggers
• Only use complete sentences
• If possible use whole paragraphs and read each
  word to the audience because they can not be
  expected to read anything for themselves. What do
  you think youre paid for?

5
Show All Points Immediately

• Overwhelm them with content
• Dont lead people to logical conclusions
• Let them search among the points
• Leave them wondering where youre up to

6
Use small fonts

• Be humble - use a small font
• Important people sit at the front
• Who cares if others cant see?

• Be humble - use a small font
• Important people sit at the front
• Who cares if others cant see?

7
Use Colour, lots of COLOUR!

• Flagrant use of colour dodgy research
• Its unfair to emphasize some words over others

Make everything blend in
8
Use Bright Backgrounds

• Dont worry about contrast
• Dont worry about contrast
• Dont worry about contrast
• Dont worry about contrast
• Dont worry about contrast

9
Use lots of fonts

• Make sure that you use as many
• fonts and sizes as possible
• on each slide to keep the audience
• interested!
• In what you have to say...

10
Center all text

• Center all
• text because
• it looks nice and
• even
• that way, and because you
• can!
• And ignore all phrasing.

11
Place text over pictures

• Confucius A picture is worth a 1000 words

• Dijkstra Pictures are for weak minds

12
Use Clipart on every slide
13
Use lots of sound animation

• Using lots of sound is a good way to keep the
  people interested in what I have to say.

• so I will make sure that I use

lots
and lots and lots
Because more is better.
14
Never Make Eye Contact

• Avert your eyes to show respect

• Mumbling will force people to concentrate

• Blocking the screen also adds mystery

The answer to life,the universe andeverything
isunable to be seen.
15
Never Skip Slides

• You prepared the slides
• People came for the whole talk
• Talk faster when necessary
• Skip summary and conclusion

16
Never, Ever Practice

• Practice is a waste of time
• You want to appear spontaneous
• Dont take any suggestions on board
• Ensure you have too much material for the time
  allocated