[sdiy] open letter to Aaron Lanterman

[Rainer Buchty]

On Fri, 7 May 2010, David G. Dixon wrote:

> I hate to be the voice of dissent here (actually, I kinda like it, but
> nevertheless...), but:

I think things need to be differentiated.

Youtube is definitely a cool way to present things to the public. This 
will likely attract future students, as I know a lot of high schoolers 
(and not just them...) are just spending their day browsing "cool 
videos" on Youtube.

This may not only foster interest in Synth DIY, seeing that this is no 
black magic, but even make them chose GaTech over other universities 
just because they (a) know it already from the videos and (b) go for the 
"coolness" factor of stuff.

But: for presentation and documentation Youtube (or any streaming media, 
for that matter) -- IMO -- definitely is the wrong approach for several 
reasons.

I'd like to *read* stuff. For me it's a much faster way of digesting 
input than listening to audio streams or watching video streams.

Reading enables me quickly jump back and forth between pieces of 
information, and it also transports much more information per time than 
any video/audio stream can do. If it's my book/printout, I can also 
scribble annotations, improvements, or errata onto it.

Plus, I can keep it in an old-fashioned file, which will survive any 
harddrive crash, system change, and change of data formats.

Of course, there are things where multimedia stuff definitely has its 
benefits. There's a difference between reading e.g. Antti's equations 
regarding different filter types and listening to sound examples, or 
reading about F and Q parameters compared to hearing them in action.

> 3) Powerpoint is like anything else: in the right hands, it can be
> brilliant; in the wrong hands, it can be awful.

Powerpoint (and Word, for that matter) leaves the editor with the 
impression that he's good at text design and layout. Which he usually 
isn't -- most people, frankly, stink here and already have biggest 
problems with structuring their content...

That leads to horrible page layouts, clubs, widows, tiny fonts, umpteen 
levels of indentation and a gazillion of text formatting sins, etc.

And usual office software even fosters that by e.g. automatically 
shrinking the font size if you put too much text into a text box. For 
slides, this is just outright bad.

Personally, I use LaTeX for all my text work, including slides (using 
the LaTeX beamer package). It's becoming a little bit painful when it 
comes to picture placement, agreed, but that also forces me to use 
pictures wisely. (Yes, I could even do animations if I wanted, but also 
that somewhat relates to pain and suffering.)

Plus, it gives me an excuse for using good old blackboard and chalk :)

Rainer