Six Word Speeches?

The biweekly review of speaking topics over at Six Minutes blog tries to outdo Twitter’s 140 character limit by proposing six-word speeches:

• SpeakerNet News held a contest soliciting six-word speeches. Participants were asked to capture speaking wisdom (in several categories) in just six words. Difficult? Impossible? Check out some of the winners:

Give wisdom away; it returns tenfold. (Charlie Hawkins)

Stand up, be great, sit down. (Margaret McDonald)

Speak eloquently, be funny, get paid (Doc Blakely)

Reading from PowerPoint slides brings snores. (Pamela Alexandra)

This reminds me of public speaking haiku!

No Meeting on 23 May

The May 23 meeting is cancelled. Get ready for the marathon after the holiday.

Ignite: A Model for Using Slides

I don’t know much about Ignite, but I’m going to find out more.  As Garr Reynolds explains at Presentation Zen:

I love the Ignite format — 20 slides, advanced automatically after 15 seconds (total: 5 minutes). I actually like this format a little better than Pecha Kucha. Ignite short-form presentations are a little bit faster and a little bit shorter than the Pecha Kucha style (which is also good), and this often leads to tighter talks. The point of an Ignite talk is not to rush through the topic or to dumb it down, but rather to work within the constraints to illuminate and illustrate the essence of your idea and of your story.

Watch the sample videos and you’ll be intrigued, if not amazed, by how well the visual aids are used.