On Mon, 2009-01-05 at 13:47 -0500, Jonah H. Harris wrote:If you need a standardized template to get your message across in a
useful way then you are likely not someone who should be doing public speaking in the first place.
Personally, the only argument I see for standardization is it makes the conference feel more professional. Having been to a fair amount of conferences, I'm more impressed by the ones that put an emphasis on the polish of the event, matching collateral materials (logos, signage, etc). Obviously content is king, but second to content is how the content is conveyed, the design image of a conference.
I'm not sure why the argument is not about image. It rather seems to be about the quality of a presenter and if a present needs/doesn't need standardization.
There is no reason why a standard slide deck template can't encompass all different slide layouts. Think of it like letterhead for the conference.
The most compelling reason I've heard for non-standard templates is the wide variety of presentation tools (or lack of presentation tools)that people use.
