PowerPoint: Killer App? - Washington Post

"Did PowerPoint make the space shuttle crash? Could it doom another mission? Preposterous as this may sound, the ubiquitous Microsoft 'presentation software' has twice been singled out for special criticism by task forces reviewing the space shuttle disaster.

Perhaps I've sat through too many PowerPoint presentations lately, but I think the trouble with these critics is that they don't go far enough: The software may be as much of a mind-numbing menace to those of us who intend to remain earthbound as it is to astronauts."

Engineering by Powerpoint. It is not a new phenomena. Companies have been moving this direction for the last decade, and it is only natural that the government should follow. It is not the prefered way to document information, but increasingly their is never time or budget to do it properly. And by properly I mean in a manner that allows those who follow to "stand on our shoulders" or at least to not have to start from scratch. Knowledge must be passed from experienced engineers to the younger engineers, and Powerpoint is not the correct way to do it. Knowledge must also be conveyed to management, and Powerpoint is not always the best way to do it. But that doesn't mean that anything will change. Memos seem to be from a older era...

Technology | Engineering