Bruce Hohne

I believe many companies are trying to make everything skinner and faster. Speed and mobility is key for companies and users. Phones are now introduced with Finger Print scanners which is safer and faster for users. Many companies are competing in the tablet industy because this is a key market. Still, the markey potencial is high and I believe making laptop thinner they can capture a good portion of the tablet market. Now many laptops are touch screen and can fold to become a tablet. And the new MacBook Air is 24 percent thinner and its only 2 pounds. With the smaller logic board which helped Macbook make it smaller. I feel like this is going to happen every industry. If you remember the cell phone industry, phones used to so big and fat and then the industry has progessed to become thinner and thinner. I still remember when the Motorola razer came and how crazy people went and now we have iPhone 6 and its still getting slimmer

I found this article is very interesting because I had one internship experiences that there software system was not good enough for me to convert or share any kinds of data.
Following with the survey questions and judge for myself, I would definitely seeing myself using Slack at work because if the software integrates tools like DropBox and provide services that all can communicate in one, it will increase the work efficiency.
Slack will remove the barriers from communicating in between the employees. It will helps and share ideas in one spot and make easier for people to decide the ideas.
Especially, project manager will benefit from using Slack, because it is easier for them to control and manage other employees.

Thanks

Like we discussed in class CRM systems are a great tool for a business. Looking at CRM’s from an E-commerce point of view CRM’s allows companies to make suggestions on certain products to a customer ex: customers also bought this with this product, or a similar products section at the bottom of the page. This would be an advantage because it usually will get the customer to purchase more than just one item before they check out. A disadvantage to this is when the company crosses that fine line going from using a CRM as a business tool too becoming a little creepy/stalker, which will scare people away. For example, during class the professor told us how Target used their CRM to send a pregnant girl coupons for fertility item.

Overall I love CRM systems. The more a company knows about its customers the more profitable it will be.

You are behind. By Tuesday you should have narrowed your brainstorming down to a single idea. You have catching-up to do.

Sending content ahead of time definitely has value, and it’s something i’ve never considered either. I think it’s tough in a classroom setting though, for a number of reasons. When doing school presentations, we’re pretty programmed to do exactly what the professor tells us, and I know that i’ve personally never had a professor to tell me to send my presentation to the rest of the class ahead of time. Another issue with that is that most people would probably ignore it. A lot of people would probably assume that since they’re going to see the presentation anyway, they don’t need to look at it ahead of time. There’s also the potential for people looking at the presentation ahead of time and then not attending the actual presentation, because they don’t feel the need to. I know that in many of my courses, when a professor provides slides ahead of time (especially if they aren’t making attendance mandatory), many students just look at the information on their own and then don’t attend the class at all.

As far as handouts go, I think there needs to be a balance. The handouts should just highlight the main takeaways of the presentation (perhaps the 3 main points), so that even if people only remember 3 points, they can have them in writing with additional details. I think handouts need to be kept concise and pertinent to the subject matter, otherwise they can become distracting and cause information overload.

Sending out content ahead of time is definitely a good strategy, but only if the audience actually reads the slides beforehand and if the presenter then actively engages the audience. At least in the case of students, I think most students probably don’t look at the slides until the professor is covering them. For example, in class last Thursday, most of us had not looked at any of the required videos/readings for class, so the professor was not able to have a more engaging lecture. On the other hand, if the professor doesn’t engage, and the students have already read the slides, then I think students will just try to work on other things instead.
As for the handouts, I agree with Jacklin in that there needs to be a balance. If the presenter just simply gives handouts with everything on it, then the audience more focus more on reading them instead of listening to the presenter. Providing handouts with only the main takeaways would be a good balance, though.
As for the other points mentioned, I mostly agree with them. Mixing up the media, interspersing content, and using eye-catching software can certainly be good strategies to keep the audience interested in the PowerPoint. Using props can go either way though. I think that as long as the prop actually adds to the presentation rather than come off as silly of meaningless, then it can be a good tool.

I think it is crucial to send out PowerPoints prior to a presentation because it allows the audience members get a better idea of what the presentation will cover. It also allows the audience to come up with potential questions ahead of time, based off the slides. Also, by handing out copies, audience members can focus more on what you are saying and less on copying the words on the slides. For example, I have had several professors who would not provide slides prior to class. As a result, I would copy half the notes on the slides and only write down half of what the professor was saying. This caused me to have incomplete and ineffective notes. It’s important to handout slides prior, but I agree with John and Jacklin that it needs to be balanced. Having all the information a presenter will go over on the slides that are distributed to the audience would be an overload. Although it’s important to share slides ahead of time, for student presentations in class, they are not necessary. I feel many students aren’t listening to student presentations because they don’t need the information to pass the course.
For the other points mentioned, I think mixing up media and using props can be problematic. First, with mixing up media, I feel a lot of people try to use multiple forms of media in their PowerPoint because they know it’s a good idea, but do it in a way that’s ineffective. I have seen many presentations put up media that doesn’t link to the topic or distract from it. One in particular I recall is a presentation on LEGOs. On one slide there was a picture of a person with a prosthetic leg made out of LEGOs which distracted myself as well as the professor, causing the image to take away from the main point of the presentation. As far as props go, I think it comes down to what the prop is and how it’s utilized. You can have a potentially good prop, but use it in a way that doesn’t convey the message.

I agree with James about the use of props. Especially in a professional setting, I think it would be very easy for props to become distracting. Either it’s going to make the discussion stray from the content, or it’s going to be such an obvious demonstration of what you’re trying to say that it’s also going to be ineffective. The only way to determine if the particular prop you have in mind is going to be effective is to really analyze the audience you’re going to be presenting to. If it’s you’re going to show a new type of software to a group of web developers, it’ll probably be well received. Showing that same software to high schoolers (in general) probably won’t have much on an impact.
I also think that group exercises are effective only if the audience is familiar with one another. As a relatively introverted person, if I’m taking time out of my day at work to see a lecture and the speaker uses 20 minutes of that time to have me introduce myself and do a silly exercise with the person next to me, I’m probably going to be annoyed.

To expand on Jacklin and John’s points regarding handouts, I agree that handouts that contain only a presentation’s main points are the most effective. When studying for tests in lecture-based classes, I prefer reviewing handouts that outline main points to having to trudge through pages of my notes (most of which was copied directly from the slides, anyway). Along with making studying a more focused exercise, providing simple handouts frees up an audience to focus on the presenter’s verbal contributions and take notes elaborating on the presenter’s key remarks.
Another idea that I have seen successfully and unsuccessfully employed is to give an audience handouts with fill-in-the-blank style main points—for example, “Artist Paul Gaugin made important contributions to the _________ art movement.” When successful, this tactic enhances audience engagement because it discourages audience members from “zoning out.” When unsuccessful, this tactic causes audience members to obsess over filling in their handouts, making them completely tune out spoken information unrelated to the handout’s points. As with any other technique, a presenter must understand his audience’s attention span and interest level.

I agree with you that this unveil of Windows 10 will be welcomed with open arms across industries. It is becoming ever important to have a multiple desktop feature to help business men and women who travel frequently. This functionality will improve the way employees share data and will make aligning business objectives much easier. It is also a huge plus that the software will run the same on a tablet that it will on a desktop. This will make business decision making easier when “on the go”.

I am very happy to see someone post articles about Windows 10.
This brings me back in memories of when I adapted Windows 7 and 8. The upgrade of Windows is huge impacts on society such as businesses and schools. Especially, the ‘Snap Assist’ will allows us to share programs and be able to set-up all platforms into one product. This idea is sensational for all other technologies and I strong believe that people will easily adapt this feature. I want to see how Windows will launching this new features into new technologies.

I’m not really sure what to think of Windows 10. I have yet to switch to 8 myself because I’ve used it enough to know that it’s not useful for my purposes, so I hope that 10 reverts back to the classic Windows interface. If Microsoft can pull that off and implement some new non-intrusive features then I think a lot of people will be inclined to make the switch, and will do so with little difficulty. If done correctly, I think Snap Assist will be a great feature, one that will attract consumers. However, Microsoft has had difficulty with synchronization among several platforms. They have tried to do something like this with previous iterations of Windows and have tried cross-system interaction with the PC and Xbox systems, but largely these connections were unstable and weren’t used. It sounds like Snap Assist offers more useful synchronization than previously though, so it it might work out. I’m anxious to see how Windows 10 turns out and as of right now I’d say I’m likely to purchase it.