Really, I'm working on those Sibelius 5 and Numbers write-ups. Maybe a three-day weekend will allow me to catch up. Heaven forbid I'm still behind when I install Leopard!

Engadget: It's on: Apple event slated for September 5th



Bring on the Cover Flow iPods. Oh, and the tag-line is interesting in context with this excerpt from an old Apple Corp. press release about the Beatles breaking up (found here):

"The world is still spinning and so are we and so are you. When the spinning stops--that'll be the time to worry. Not before. The Beatles are alive and well and the beat goes on. The beat goes on."

In related news, Ringo Starr's entire back catalogue is now on iTunes.



Presentation Zen: PowerPoint tips that are clear and to the point.

Garr Reynolds reviews a new book about PowerPoint called Clear and To the Point: 8 Psychological Principles for Compelling PowerPoint Presentations. He highly recommends the book and illustrates some of the discussed concepts. Even when reviewing another's work, Mr. Reynolds remains highly interesting and informative!

Tags: technology, powerpoint, itunes/ipods

Presentation Zen: Steve Jobs and the art of the swordsman

This is a good post by Garr Reynolds about the Art of Steve when it comes to presentations. Good stuff.



Ars Technica: Adobe, Microsoft accused of infringing on browser-related patents

Here we go again. All I want to know is why this company was awarded this patent years after this specific interface paradigm was already in use.



Apple – QuickTIme – Apple Special Event – August 2007

If you want to watch Steve Jobs' presentation from yesterday, it's right here. A fast connection is recommended.



Apple – iWork – Trial

If you have a Mac, you should download the trial version of iWork '08. It's only a 469 MB download!



Wired: Aug. 7, 1991: Ladies and Gentlemen, the World Wide Web

The "tubes" went public, and the world began to change.



Engadget: Apple calls multitouch Mac a "research project"

Sounds like Apple is still considering adding multitouch support to Macs. Chances are, this will show up in notebooks before desktops. I was not suprised that yesterdays announcements did not include a multitouch Mac.

Tags: powerpoint, microsoft, software, macintosh, apple inc, browsers, adobe

Apple – iPhone
The iPhone site got a makeover today. Gone is the black spartan appearance. Now it looks a lot like the iPod + iTunes page.





Ars Technica: Notebook mania leads to revised PC market projections

As notebooks prove themselves more and more capable of replacing desktops for most people – with the exception of serious power users – I expect this trend will continue.



Copyblogger: Do You Make These Mistakes When You Write?

Coppyblogger reminds us of some common grammar mistakes many are guilty of (including myself).



Presentation Zen: One secret to a healthy life (and a great presentation)

The problem with most presentation is that they are too long, not too short. Performers, for example, know that the trick is to leave the stage while the audience still loves you and don’t want you to go, not after they have had enough and are "full" of you.

Tags: technology, blogging, powerpoint, iphone

Presentation Zen: Two Questions: Why does it matter? What's your contribution?

From the post:

When assessing presenters, then, you may want to measure them against these four question (among others): Who are you? What do you do? Why does it matter to us? What did you contribute? If these answers are clear and the contribution was beyond expectation, then chances are the hour was not a wasted one.

Whenever I approach presentations, I feel like if I can effectively and quickly answer those second two questions, the need for the audience to worry about who I am and what I do becomes irrelevant.

Tags: powerpoint

GameSpy has a couple of amusing articles helping you figure out if you are more of a computer gamer or a console gamer. Based on these lists, I currently fall firmly into the console camp. However, I can remember being a PC gaming snob at one point.

• GameSpy: Top 10 Ways to Know You're a PC Snob
• GameSpy: Top 10 Ways to Tell You're a Console Fanboy

Presentation Zen: Who says we need our logo on every slide?

Garr Reynolds takes a look at the value (or lack thereof) in overusing brand imagery. For more, check out my post on this same topic.



Daring Fireball: The iPhone’s Funny Price

John Gruber takes a look at Steve Ballmer's negative iPhone remarks and a contradiction in his Windows Mobile claims. What amazes me is that Ballmer projects the iPhone picking up 2-3% cellular market-share like its a bad thing. Steve Jobs said Apple is aiming at 1% with the iPhone launch.



Engadget: Proposals would turn highways into wind farms

Why has no one thought of this before?

Tags: video games, powerpoint, environment, iphone

Presentation Zen: Flip charts as visual enhancers

Garr Reynolds blogs about the advantages of using a flip chart as a visual aid during your presentations.

Tags: powerpoint

Presentation Zen: PowerPoint: sometimes you have to laugh to keep from crying

This is a great collection of humorous PowerPoint related videos. My favorites are "Is there life after death by PowerPoint?" and "Chicken, chicken, chicken."



Andrews McMeel Publishing: Fans From Around the World Interview Bill Watterson

It's a nice set of questions. Unfortunately, no one asks when on earth he's going to return from the sky and save us from the sheer banality of recent comic strips. (I mean, come on, Garfield hasn't been funny in ages; Zits is fine; but the funniest comic is Peanuts ... by a dead guy!)

PS - Calvin is my hero.



The Inquirer: S.T.A.L.K.E.R. not nicking art after all

Well, that's good. I still don't like typing that title...



Flickr: Steve Jobs on the cover of April 1993 UnixWorld

He looks so much different with hair...



Apple – Final Cut Studio 2

This is a pretty big update to Apple's professional film editing suite. Along with all existing components receiving new and upgraded features, a new application called Color has been added. I'm not going to tell you the price here. It's too high risk for people with heart conditions, who are pregnant, or who could possible have blood pressure – of any kind.

Tags: powerpoint, silly, video games, software

Presentation Zen has a couple of good entries about faults surrounding PowerPoint and the option of avoiding the application (and those like it) entirely.

• David Byrne on PowerPoint: Freedom – who needs it?
• Is it finally time to ditch PowerPoint?

Daring Fireball has two posts regarding some facts about AAC and some of the recent misinformation spreading around regarding the audio format.

• Some Facts About AAC
• A Wee Bit More on AAC, Ogg, and MP3

Nobel Intent: Teachers and testing under scrutiny

I love the opening lines:

Education is a perennial political football. It is one of those lovely subjects where everyone feels that, since they went to school once, they have an equally valid view of "what is wrong with education today."

TUAW: More Leopard Delay Reaction

In case you didn't here, Leopard is experiencing a four-month release delay from June to October. My take is that the sky is not falling – not even close. Others disagree. TUAW's post here aggregates some sensible and entertaining views on the delay.

Tags: powerpoint, technology, education, leopard, drm, os x

How much quality content is on your slides that is digestible and meaningful to your audience? Presentation Zen takes a couple of posts looking at our signal-to-noise ratio. (I especially like his slide makeovers in the second post.)

• Signal-to-Noise ratio and the elimination of the nonessential
• Slide design: signal vs. noise (redux)

CPUs: Seven Blog Virtues

Kathy Sierra posts some great tips (in PDF format) on producing a well-received blog. This is essential reading for all of us bloggers out here!



DT: 12 Ways to Boycott the RIAA

Mark Fleischmann:

The RIAA’s degeneration into a corporate bully is both sad and self-defeating. Warring against consumers has not reversed declining CD sales or replaced eroding revenues with legal downloads. It has merely turned off a new generation of consumers, possibly forever.

I think the RIAA should start reading Creating Passionate Users.

Tags: powerpoint, blogging, riaa

Instigator Blog: 5 Phrases You Never Want to Hear in a Presentation

Let me additionally say that you should never begin your talk by telling people what you aren't going to cover. Also, the author of this post mentions participation as an important part of your talk. I do agree, but don't force it. No participation is better than forced participation.



TUAW: Where OS X 'Big Cat' code names REALLY come from

I like the German tank theory better, but this is probably a more realistic origin.



Wii Fanboy: Spielburg working on Wii game with EA

Let's hope these games are more Minority Report and Saving Private Ryan than they are Hook or The Lost World.



I'm a little late getting these put up, but here are 1Up.com's lists of most wanted games this year. As an aside, I'm playing Burnout: Dominator (on the PS2 list) right now, and it is very fun. I don't miss crash mode very much, but the lack of traffic checking is taking some getting used to.

Top 10: PC • Top 10: Wii • Top 10: DS • Top 10: PSP • Top 10: PS2 • Top 10: PS3 • Top 10: XBox 360

Tags: powerpoint, tiger, leopard, video games, os x

Presentation Zen: Don't make a speech. Put on a show.

I think I feel a blog post being inspired as I read this entry.



Indexed: WIth Penguin's Viking Studio

Congratulations, Jessica!



Pathological paranoia can only go untreated for so long before the victim destroys him- or herself. It's like the RIAA is a case study in a psychology textbook.

• Ars Technica: RIAA launches propaganda, lawsuit offensive against college students
• Ars Technica: RIAA slams FAIR USE Act

Ars Technica: The gaming-violence connection: why society finds it comforting

From the article:

"Far from being a new danger, the Sternheimer suggests that gaming is simply the latest in a long series of media influences to take the blame. "Over the past century, politicians have complained that cars, radio, movies, rock music, and even comic books caused youth immorality and crime, calling for control and sometimes censorship." She terms the targets of such efforts "folk devils," items branded dangerous and immoral that serve to focus blame and fear."

Tags: riaa, video games, powerpoint

Presentation Zen: Bullets and "delusional briefing slides"

Wow. The lesson here? PowerPoint is not meant to create documents!



MCV: Nintendo Ends GameCube Support

The GameCube flat out did not do well in the US. It was perceived as underpowered (though its processor alone was nearly twice as fast as the PS2) and as a toy by gamers. I really like my Cube, and, though I own few GCN games, those I own are among my favorites.

Hopefully, the Wii fares better in the long run.

Tags: video games, powerpoint

CPUs: How much control should our users have

This is another great Kathy Sierra post. Oddly enough, even though she is talking about software and product design, this concept can apply back to classrooms. How much does the payoff of the work and projects we assign to students correlate with the perceived rewards of said work?



Presentations ETC Homepage

This site offers a lot of free PowerPoint backgrounds and Keynote themes (and the Keynote themes are honest-to-goodness theme files). Most are pretty average, but I found two I like: Cloudy, a very minimalist theme, and Old Book, a nostalgic-looking theme.

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The site also contains links to several useful PowerPoint and Keynote resources.



Two more links to keep you feeling the RIAA love...

• Ars Technica: Leaked letter shows RIAA pressuring ISPs, planning discounts for early settlements
• Ars Technica: Study: P2P effect on legal music sales "not statistically distinguishable from zero"

Tags: riaa, education, powerpoint