Presentations the TED Way

I found this on Garr Reynolds's Presentation Zen website (found here).

Thanks to Tim Longhurst (The TED Commandments - rules every speaker needs to know) you can see the list in an easier to read format below:

1. Thou Shalt Not Simply Trot Out thy Usual Shtick.
2. Thou Shalt Dream a Great Dream, or Show Forth a Wondrous New Thing, Or Share Something Thou Hast Never Shared Before.
3. Thou Shalt Reveal thy Curiosity and Thy Passion.
4. Thou Shalt Tell a Story.
5. Thou Shalt Freely Comment on the Utterances of Other Speakers for the Sake of Blessed Connection and Exquisite Controversy.
6. Thou Shalt Not Flaunt thine Ego. Be Thou Vulnerable. Speak of thy Failure as well as thy Success.
7. Thou Shalt Not Sell from the Stage: Neither thy Company, thy Goods, thy Writings, nor thy Desperate need for Funding; Lest Thou be Cast Aside into Outer Darkness.
8. Thou Shalt Remember all the while: Laughter is Good.
9. Thou Shalt Not Read thy Speech.
10. Thou Shalt Not Steal the Time of Them that Follow Thee.

These are great rules, hands down, and ones we should follow as we again mount the downward stairs to PowerPoint Hell (fifth ring, I believe). I may use this with my students, too. I mean, why not? The people on TED are pretty smart, after all!

MPAA Suggests Teachers Videotape Movies

In a strange turn, the MPAA has suggested that teachers record movies using a camcorder pointed at flat screen tv's in order to use copyrighted material in the classroom. The clip is interesting, only for the fact that the thinking here is somewhat hypocritical and ironic. We can't use the material directly from the DVD in our classroms for educational purposes, but we CAN videotape the tv? Life is strange in the world of education...

Here's the clip.

MPAA shows how to videorecord a TV set from timothy vollmer on Vimeo.