This weekend, I watched slide shows made by participants in my course. Despite the bad reputation of PowerPoint presentations, I’m confident that we’ll never return to the slideless era. What matters is the weight of the slides in the presentation as a whole. What would I myself like to watch during a speech? A good slide show has a consistent appearance, but the slide template should not be too dominant; you don’t need your logo taking up 25% of every slide. Uniform colors, font types and sizes provide a clear visual impression. In general, text should appear in grammatic, complete sentences, and it shouldn’t be arranged in multi-level lists. The slides should convey serious content lightly. Slides crammed with text aren’t simply boring; they look like speaker notes that snuck onto the screen. Slides with lovely images and brief aphorisms are boring as well, just in a different way. A presentation needs variety. A long parade of slides, all with bullet points or all with images, lulls the audience to sleep — and the cure is not to make the bullets bounce or spin. Ultimately, the crucial test of the content is its impact: does it deliver value to the listeners, or only to the speaker?