Record and Deliver Your Presentations with Present.me
Present.me is a brand new presentation site that I'm very excited about.
Some people have described it as Slideshare meets Youtube.
Slideshare, if you're not familiar with it, is the most popular site for posting and sharing presentations on the web. While there are a lot of good things about Slideshare (including their annual Best Presentation contest), the format does not allow for animation, narration or video of the speaker. This has led to criticism that Slideshare encourages presenters to put everything on their slides so they can be understood without the presenter. When presenting live, however, this is anything but a best practice. Personally, I think slides are strongest when they require a presenter to fully explain them. In this way, slides function as true speaker support and not the presentation itself.
Video Narration of Your Slides
Enter present.me which allows users to upload their PowerPoint or PDF files which are then converted, animations included. Then, using your computer's webcam, you record yourself delivering the presentation (advancing slide by slide). You can stop at any point and rerecord sections. Once you are happy with the result, you can publish your slides and accompanying video narration to the site either publicly or privately. Present.me also allows you to embed your presentation on another site.
Easy Playback
The thing I love most about the site is it's playback engine: The viewer is given thumbnails of the slides so he or she can easily jump ahead or back to any section—and the video instantly picks up at the appropriate slide. Unlike most video on the web, there is no blind guessing and lag when you try to fast forward. What this means is that you can easily "skim" a long presentation, something I am sure we all wish we could do when watching certain live presentations.
Present.me is still officially in beta and the developers are working hard on improving functionality. I think the site has great possibilities including sales pitches, training modules and issues advocacy. My current favorite idea though is to use this to practice and review presentations and pitches. Imagine that your boss, who happens to be on another continent, asks to see the deck you plan on presenting to a potential client. He can comment on the slide content, but not much else.
But if you record a rehearsal with present.me, he can see your slide, but also how you'll present—what you'll say and how you'll interact with your slides. And in that way, maybe you won't be tempted to put EVERYTHING on your slides.
I've posted a few presentations under my login "nhaims". Take a look and let me know what you think!
