Slideshare & Effective PowerPoint

Slideshare is the the world's largest community for sharing presentations. Membership is free. It is a great way to get your slides out there on the web, so your ideas can be found and shared by a wide audience, or to find slideshows for your research or teaching. You can share slideshows publicly or privately, download presentations, and embed them in your blog.

Most experts agree on guidelines to creating effect PowerPoint presentations:

• Use the rule of six (called by some "joy of six"): maximum 6 lines per slide and 6 words per line.
• Maintain unity of design elements, such as color, font, and graphics.
• Test readibility using the "floor test" by placing a printed copy of a slide on the floor and reading it while standing over it. If not, increase font size or style. In general, font size should range between 18 and 48 points.
• Avoid fancy fonts or all caps -- they are difficult to read.
• Include only essential text that is self-evident.
• Minimize special effects for they can be distracting.
• Graphics, such as clip art, should not overwhelm the text. They are used as support to the text message.
• For presentation timing, consider using three slides per minute maximum.