Presentations, part 1

I know several of the members on the One City One Book team and so criticism over content would be more difficult than criticism on form. I will focus on form.

The use of that program allowing them to move across the country gave their presentation an original flair and was definitely relevant to their geographical emphasis, but the limited point-by-point access necessitated that salmon colored handout. I would have preferred a PowerPoint like bullet system. The handout was nicely formatted but two whole sections were incorrectly/poorly labeled. At first glance it is bizarre to put PROS second  and CONS sixth as these are good introductions which can be elaborated upon later. The group's concept should have been acceptably explained through supplementary material--if a library school student didn't know about it already--and allow a modicum of detail before they got into the nittygritty. All of their cons in the CONS section, which was named "Issues" in presentation but not the handout, were already referenced. They were also in the wrong order in the handout.

Had they done PowerPoint and spoke out of order rather than printed a handout I'm sure these issues would seem much less important. Instead they made the extra effort without quite meeting it.

My ignorance of E-Readers, such as what the heck "e-ink" is, makes that presentation much more interesting and enlightening. Since I don't get into the politics of being a librarian and I see myself more as an archivist, I have a hard time caring about reading disabled people. If a person has difficulty reading words or holding a codex, I hardly see it as their right that publishers and developers must bow to their wide ranging disabilities. Having never known, at least to my knowledge, any dyslexics, and as someone who has recovered without medication from alleged brain chemistry problems, I am skeptical of invisible mental disorders and wonder why we're handicapping society and encouraging people who can't rub two sentences together to enroll in college and press for their rights to have their books read to them. Be like the deaf community, the first group of citizens to latch onto and rely upon two-way pagers, buy an iPad that let's you watch TV. Meanwhile you can overcome your mental handicap as you sling coffee or bar tend for the rest of your life.

Perhaps I shouldn't write these when I'm already angry?