Book Review: "The Presentation Secrets of Steve Jobs"

better again is slide:ology

online duarte.com

if you know TED, then you know the work of nancy Duarte

Apple's success is not in Steve Jobs presentation. It is in Apple's hard work, dedication, innovation, creativity, etc. If some one thinks it is in his presentation, they are fools

I noticed similarities between the Table of Contents and http://presentationzen.com/

I'm interested to see how this book is.

Much may also be learned at http://www.presentationzen.com/
Not connected, just a fan.

While I have a great distaste for the text-heavy slides of many managers and directors who then proceed to read their entire presentation, bullet point by bullet point, it is worth remembering that Jobs' kind of presentation is for a particular kind of audience and that the "less is more" mantra cannot simply be exploited with every slide for every audience--not that anyone's said that explicitly.
As important for me, is that Job knows where each slide is going, where and how each slide fits with every other slide, and every build as well. In brief, he builds a narrative dimension into his presentations--an informed telling with a point-of-view--that helps to stitch the simplicity of his "showing" into a greater whole than the sum of their parts.
In that context, one could learn as much on presentations reading Aristotles' Poetics.

Is it me or does Carmine Gallo look like a car salesman.. not sure if I'd buy something from _that_ guy....

on-topic: Simplicity is the key, as mentioned before. And yes, preparation is everything as well. These two rules should be enough for many to create great presentations. I just wished my upper management would finally learn this, bombarding their audience with slide after slide packed with totally unreadable nonsense..

Never too old to learn, so I'll put this book on my x-mas wishlist. Always interesting to read insights about presentations, regardless of the car-salesman look of the author 8-)

Cliff Notes version:

Make beautiful products that don't suck.
Show them to the world.
Boom!

That cover should be on Photoshop Disasters for the awful attempt at the "we floor" reflection effect on the text.

At any rate, the biggest part of a Stevenote is that in spite of all the preparation beforehand, the keynote slides are simple without a lot of superfluous graphics, transitions or cheesy effects.

The one thing I've learned from Apple keynotes is that "less is more".

You'd be surprised at who needs teaching to give good presentations. Some people, like many of us here, can look at Jobs and others and pick up tips. And some have a good natural presentation style.
But having given presentations for many years now, and teaching others to present, I can say that a lot of people just have a blind spot when it comes to doing it themselves. I've seen people get up at conferences and give great presentations - no bullet points, just a few images, focusing on the speaker and the story. Then the next person gets up and bombards the audience with slide after slide of dense text, reading it from the screen, back to the audience and whispering...
(The same people who, if you give them a microphone to hold, will carry on talking waving the microphone around pointing at anything except their mouth).
Yet give them a book to read, or a handout with instructions, and they can do it.
Basically people learn differently. I learnt Flash by watching a 20 minute presentation followed by messing around myself for a while. No manual needed. Others can do nothing unless they read step by step instructions.

So basically what I'm saying is, just cos you learn by observing and mentally noting things, doesn't mean others do to. I'm tempted by this book not because it will teach me anything (though it might) but because I know there'll be a time when I have to give up showing someone what to do and just tell them to "go and read this".

I agree though - a book on presentation needs a better cover!