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Ask HN: Why does no one use google docs for presentations?

4 points by lbrandy ↗ HN
Large meetings with lots of presentations get done two ways (in my experience):

You email your slides ahead of time (or bring them on a USB stick) and share a computer and pray to god that it works.

Or everyone brings a laptop and has to bring their DVI/VGA convertor (just in case) and pray that the resolution thing works right when you plug it in, etc, etc.

It occurred to me that the web should have solved this problem a long time ago. A browser gives us a trivial way to both upload our slides to a place and to preview them exactly as they will be seen on site. It cuts out so much of the praying.

Then I realized, google docs already has this. It even lets you upload ppt files for conversion. And no one uses it? Am I crazy to think that such a service would be a good idea? Or is something wrong with google docs?

15 comments

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ichverstehe
And the web can't fail? It sure can. Just as much as the other cases.
ggrot
Google docs has a gears offline option as well.
ichverstehe
Well. And in that case, how would Google Docs be superior to Keynote/PowerPoint? Then it's just a third system that needs to be working, right?
zacharye
That's why I keep presentations on my phone. If there's a laptop, I can send it over via Bluetooth. If not, I can connect my TV-out to a projector and control with a Bluetooth keyboard. Trusting a hosting site and a web connection leaves too much up to chance.
SwellJoe
What phone do you have that has a TV out?
zacharye
N95 8GB. All I need to carry is a cable and my iGo Stowaway.
ordinaryman
Even Google does not seem to use/promote it extensively. Refer to a recent blog post in GAE, except for the one session, all others have their slides as PDF (no embedded or "View as slideshow" option) !! http://googleappengine.blogspot.com/2008/06/google-io-sessio...

Also try searching for filetype:ppt in Google. Though there is a "View as HTML" link, there is no "View as slideshow". They do have it available in Gmail, though.

Not sure whether Google uses it inside for its own meetings or in its developer conferences. HN users who have attended such conferences may add details.

When normal users are trained to use such online services, it will be adopted in a better way. That will probably happen when a player like Google removes its "View as HTML" from its services (or hides it below) and promotes "View as Slideshow" alone.

SwellJoe
Momentum is strong in any major corporation. Google still has Exchange running for their people who refuse to use GMail (and for BlackBerry users). It's not just presentations...even at Google, a lot of people are afraid of new technology and continue to use whatever it is that they're accustomed to. And that makes sense, in many cases...if it takes a day to understand a new product well enough to use it to the same level you used the old product, you've just lost a day of productivity. Everybody does the math on the additional value that product provides them differently. Maybe for some, data portability is not a big enough benefit to overcome the lack of flashy slideshows, existing PPT templates they may have been refining for years, and the time it takes to figure things out.
teuobk
Part of the problem is that, for better or for worse, Microsoft Office is the standard in corporations. Everybody in the company knows how to create, open, and display PowerPoint presentations. Replacing PowerPoint would require a massive retraining effort and expense. I'm not sure that the benefits of a browser-based solution can compensate.

To make matters worse, it's not just a training problem. I've worked places where document management systems were designed to work with MS Office documents and PDFs -- and that's it. Everything else had to be converted to one of the supported formats before it could be stored in the system and routed for approval. A broken system? Perhaps. My point is that IS system limitations can also be reasons for the workforce at a company to stick with MS Office.

vaksel
because almost everyone has powerpoint installed from when they installed office. + Most people have been using it from when they were in high school
iamnirav
PowerPoint and Keynote also offer much higher fidelity and quality than Google Docs. Also, in many corporations it's against policy to upload confidential information to external servers, which rules out most web services. I've heard that Google actually uses PowerPoint and Keynote internally.
kcy
Actually from what I've seen Google uses Google Docs extensively internally including for presentations within groups. Sharing docs is so much easier that way. I think most people use ppt for outside / important presentations though.
streety
I've seen slideshare used for making presentations but certainly not routinely.

Dave McClure used slideshare to give his presentation at BarcampScotland2008. If I remember correctly there was just one incident when he moved backwards in the slide stack rather than forwards due to some issue with the interface. Overall though it went as smoothly as any presentation from powerpoint.

Personally I wouldn't rely on a web service. I usually have a couple of backups of my presentation with me for anything important though and I would consider a web service as one of those additional backups.

The presentation is at http://www.slideshare.net/dmc500hats/startup-metrics-for-sco...

bitrhymes
you need to have google account to view slides. which world are they living in. google is so 2006.