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by Martin Fowler.
Original Post: Bliki: Slideument
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A slideument is a cross between a slide deck and a document. The
idea is that you can use a single slide deck both for slides during
your presentation and as a handout for people to read afterwards.
The trouble is that those two needs lead to very different
requirements on your slides, so you can't satisfy them both. The
result is that slideuments usually fail at both.
The main reason they fail is due to the amount of words and
detail you need in the deck. If you want a stand-alone document you
need enough context to make sense without the speaker being there.
This requires a lot of words. But if the speaker is there, and
speaking, then the audience ends up both reading and listening - and
usually not concentrating properly on either. A good slide deck is a
VisualChannel, it provides an accompaniment to the spoken
words, reinforcing but not duplicating what is being said.
If people want a stand-alone document, then you can provide them
with one - but it should be a different document, one that's
designed for reading and not speaking.
The most sensible argument I've heard in favor of slideuments is
that audience expects them, even if they are useless and never read
later. I've a lot of sympathy with this argument, as it goes back to
my first major presentation - a tutorial at OOPSLA in 1992. Since
this was a big deal for me I decided to work hard to provide an
extra-special contribution. So instead of the usual copies of
slides, I wrote a special document to support the talk - about 40 or
so pages - and provided that as a handout. That document was a much
better coverage of the topic then the slides would be. But on the day I got lots
of complaints becuase I didn't provide a copy of the slides. I am
forever grateful to Rebecca Wirfs-Brock, who was the tutorial chair
that year and backed me up.
People do expect slides, even when they don't really make any
sense, and often it's easiest just to run off a pdf. I think that
ideally you should try for more. My approach in later tutorials was
to give out both the document and the slide copies. These days I
give people my TalkNotes URI that points to relevant
articles I've written on the topic of my talk.
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