Here’s a list of some of my most popular content from 2011, including blog posts, videos, photos, and presentations. I hope you enjoy poking through this list, and more importantly, following along – reading, watching, viewing, etc – in 2012!
Testing out my RØDE VideoMic Pro – me testing out another microphone. Viewed 2617 times – proper use of keywords put my video in the first page of hits for “RØDE VideoMic Pro.”
Morphwiz – an iPad Music Creation App – me playing with an iPad synthesizer. Viewed 2134 times. Proper use of keywords and tags is the culprit again – this video appears in the first page of hits for “Morphwiz.”
OK, and my most popular video ever – Learning Blues Harp – viewed 63,469 times since 2007. Embarrassingly enough, I’m pretty certain it gets hit so much (and then gets some nasty comments) is because of my poor use of keywords! When I titled the video “Learning Blues harp,” I really meant “I’m just starting to learn blues harp.” Everyone else apparently clicks on the video, thinking “I’m going to learn HOW TO PLAY blues harp from an expert!” Oops.
Earlier this week, I spoke at the New Berlin Public Library in Wisconsin for the Waukesha County Federated Library System – Wisconsin has some great librarians for sure!
This was a well-attended talk, and there was some really good discussion afterwards. They are definitely thinking about and planning for the future.
And – just for the attendees – I warned you guys! I said I would post this pic to Flickr, and I did. It also makes a great addition to this post. Text is often much better with visuals…
Anyway – here’s the Slideshare version of my Wisconsin talk. This was a longer presentation (3 hours), and I combined some thoughts from my usual Freak Out presentation and my newer Creating Customer Experience presentations. The content blends together pretty nicely.
While in beautiful Australia, I met lots of cool librarians … and gave a couple of presentations, too. Here are the Slideshare versions of the presentations – you had to be there to get the full effect, but still – it gives a glimpse.
Freak Out , Geek Out, Seek Out – I found a couple of Australia examples for this presentation, which was fun.
Modern LibGeek Landscape – some Provocative Questions. A bit of explanation on this one. It was meant to start discussions, and be a bit “out there.” Hence the odd questions!
A couple of weeks ago, I gave a presentation using my iPad, and it worked out pretty well! I used the iPad version of Keynote (Apple’s Powerpoint-like presentation software). Keynote has a handy-dandy presenter notes feature that is really easy to use, so your notes are on your screen, and your slides still appear on the LCD projector – in a much easier and user-friendly way than Powerpoint.
Guess what? The iPad version of Keynote does the same thing. The screengrab above shows the presenter notes view on the iPad. If there’s more text than shows on the screen, just use your finger to scroll down to the rest of the text.
You also use your finger to advance slides – just swipe the screen, and slides advance. Swipe the other way to go back a slide. Pretty simple to use!
Now – how did it work?
It was really easy to set up and use – I just needed to get the iPad VGA adapter, and plug that into our LCD projector. Then the iPad magically did everything else, so I didn’t have to mess with screen resolution compatibility, etc.
I was able to stand up in front of the room (I was presenting for the library’s Board of Trustees, who sit at a long table) with no podium – I just held the iPad, and finger-swiped away.
There were a couple of oddities, too:
If you stand with the iPad, you need to hold onto the VGA cable. Otherwise, the weight of the cable will pull iPad VGA adapter out of your iPad. Not good.
Finger swiping the slides felt a bit odd to me – I’m used to clicking a hand-held thingie to advance slides.
Most important – the on-screen slide appeared first, followed by the presenter notes, so there was a bit of lag time. It looked weird for a bit, so I was swiping back and forth, looking for the correct notes, until I figured out the 1 second lag. Once I figured that out, I was ok.
So – looking to do a presentation without having to lug around a laptop? You might consider using an iPad/Keynote setup – easy stuff!
Here’s my newest presentation, given today at INCOL (Inland Northwest Council of Libraries). It was a fun day – and I was able to hang out at Coeur d’Alene Public Library in Coeur d’Alene, ID.
Here’s the Slideshare version of the presentation!
I gave a couple of presentations at last week’s Computers in Libraries conference (ok – 5, to be exact). I just uploaded them to Slideshare – here they are:
My last 10 posts have been talking about how to improve your presentations. Hope you found some of the tips useful! Here are all 10 tips in one handy list:
I always do a dry run-through of my presentations the evening before I give them. If it’s a longer, multi-hour seminar, I probably won’t – but I WILL look through my slides, give some thought to how long each section should run, make sure I have time for Q&A at appropriate places, etc.
But if it’s an hour-long presentation or under? Yep – I’ll probably run through it once or twice. I know – some of you are saying “well, gee David. Glad that works for you – but I don’t need to do that.”
Really? Sure, your presentation might be fine. Yay for you. But I’m guessing this – if you DID rehearse, even just a little bit – your presentation would be that much better.
For the rest of us – if you don’t rehearse, it shows. Here’s why I rehearse:
To make sure my transitions work.
to make sure my timing is accurate (ever seen someone get the 5-minute warning at the end of a presentation, and they freak out because they still have 20 slides to go over? Sure sign that person didn’t rehearse).
To practice saying any specific things I want to say, and to make sure I can actually talk coherently over each of my points.
OK – and to feel better about the whole thing, too.
So go rehearse – your presentations will rock that much more if you do.
I’ve seen this (and experienced it, too) – someone wants to show off their new website or a new web tool during a presentation. So they go to the site, and then discover the either the conference center’s web access is down, or it’s not fast enough to handle the demonstration.
Then the presenter is stuck – that part of the presentation depended on the web actually working! Darn it.
Here’s the solution – use screenshots. The live web isn’t predictable … especially when you’re standing in front of a room full of people … and will most definitely slow you down during a presentation. Even if web access is working great, using it during a presentation will still most likely slow the presentation down as you wait for the next page to load.
So if you can, use screenshots to get your point across. Screenshots often work fine during a presentation, and can speed things along. They also give you the option to be a bit creative. For example, int he screenshot accompanying this post, I took a screenshot of a website, and then layered some text and soem arrows to help get my point across.
Obviously, sometimes you will need to go to the live web – training sessions or in-depth “how does this work” sessions pretty much require the real thing. But in most other cases screenshots probably work just as well, if not better.
Tip #4: Learn how to use your PC (or the PC you’ll be using for the presentation)
I have to admit it – it bugs me when someone stands up in front of everyone – especially at a tech conference – accidentally moves to the next slide … and can’t figure out how to go back to the previous slide.
They get all flustered, blame “technology,” and finally decide to solve the problem by getting out of presentation mode, finding the proper slide, then restarting the presentation. Or by just skipping that slide.
I get it – when we’re standing up in front of people giving a presentation, it’s weird – and we sometimes get a bit flustered when things go wrong. That makes sense.
Because of that, I’d suggest this – take 10 minutes to figure out that PC, and the software you’re using for the presentation. Find all the different ways to advance slides (spacebar, arrow keys, etc). Figure out how to go back to the previous slide (as in the left/right arrow keys).
If you’re planning to do some slightly advanced stuff like playing a video, either in-presentation or not, make sure you test it multiple times – in your office AND on stage. Make sure you know how to turn up the audio.
Do this little bit of prep work, and you’ll look that much more confident and knowledgeable. That weird feeling you get when you’re doing a speaking gig? It’ll still be there (the only way to get rid of that is lots of experience or being an uber-extrovert) … but at least you’ll know how to go back to that slide you just skipped!
Tip #8: rehearse!
Tip #5: Use screenshots, not the live web. 
Tip #4: Learn how to use your PC (or the PC you’ll be using for the presentation)
