But calling it anti-intellectual is like saying that sampling a few new foods at a buffet isn’t eating (to use your comestibles metaphor.) A buffet may not be the gourmet meal you prefer, but the nibbles still have nutritional value, and can be a nice way to learn about new foods that you’ve never tried before. You might even see how you to integrate those foods into your gourmet meal somewhere down the line.

My 2 truffles. I mean cents. Damn, now I’m hungry…

Similar to Sarah’s take on it, I find active audience engagement is much better than any one-way presentation format, no matter the length. But if it is going to be a one-way affair, the shorter the better for me.

There are a few lessons to be learned from the Pecha Kucha format.
- It is possible to make a good point in 6 minutes 40 seconds. That also means that 45min session could have at least 6 good points
- You can have a Pecha Kucha presentation run automatically, which means it can be running on a loop at a poster session or display.
- YouTube has a limit of 10 minute videos, so the Pecha Kucha format is ideal.
- It would make a great exercise for student presentations.

There’s probably more but this is what I can think of at the moment.

I really appreciate your push for details, though personally, I prefer conferences where we are in the kitchen together. I like presentations that are smaller, that allow for questions, discussions, collaboration.

CiL was my first experience with Pecha Kucha and I think it works well as a reminder to use the things we already know about. It’s a refresher in a refreshing way. But for new content or contentious ideas, it might come off as unsatisfying. Like a ho ho.

And given that the Pecha Kucha proposal has turned into a half-day preconference workshop (if you’re talking about the acceptance I think you are), I think Pecha Kucha is out the window anyway, because it’s no longer appropriate, so we don’t have to worry about that – we can do something with substance.

Also, the CDC has warned us against tomatoes, so I’ll take my intellectual presentation sans heirloom tomahtoes, s’il vous plait

You make some really good points, and have convinced to revisit my opinion in a little while. I’ll probably remain skeptical in the meanwhile, though

That food metaphor did go a wee bit off track, didn’t it? (I like hoho’s too, but I’d never consider them substantive food.) I’m just going to blame it on the fact that summer has come here very late (even later than usual), and my frustrated craving for fresh garden stuff might be getting out of control.

I’m curious though — the pecha kucha format is foreign to everyone, isn’t it? I thought it was a brand new thang…

I suspect that a certain measure of the problems you identify derive from the presenter(s), rather than the format. But I also agree that the format doesn’t lend itself to details. So if that’s your thing, then this is not the format for you.

I, on the other hand, find that most presentations only give me, at most, one really profound takeaway. So I appreciate when someone is forced to deliver that profound takeaway in a very tightly-constructed fashion, rather than stretching it over 30-45 minutes. Our problem is that this format is totally foreign to us and people haven’t learned how to use it yet. Give it time.

You kinda lost me with the food metaphors anyway. I love HoHos.

I was never really happy with the screencast that you linked to, so while I’m here, I may as well point folks in the direction of the much more satisfying video of the entire live Pecha Kucha at Computers in Libraries, which you can find here: http://openstacks.net/os/2008/04/19/pecha-kucha-the-video/