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I never met Winston when he was still alive, sadly, but I first encountered his work when I was still in high school, learning CommonLISP from his AI book.

Every time I am sitting in the audience of a talk where someone uses overcrowded PowerPoint slides with small fonts and goes through tables of numbers that no-one in the audience can read, mumbling quietly or rushing nervously through their material, long having lost most of the audience, I feel like sending the presenters the link to this timeless masterpiece (happens at least a few dozen times per year).

It has also made me a better teacher in the lecture hall, and appreciate using chalk more, and slides less.

This clip is worth watching again every couple of years, which I do, out of enjoyment and to refresh my memory (reminds me I still need to procure some cool props for my upcoming AI1 lecture in October...).

I watched this years ago and really enjoyed it. One of the main lessons I took from it is basically, have almost 0 text on your slides. You should not be reading your slides, the audience should not have to read your slides. The slides should supplement what you are speaking about, not vice versa.

Any time I see a wall of text on a presentation, I know I can probably tune out and not miss much.

I had the privilege of taking Winston's communications/AI seminar class in college.

It was an odd format. The class outwardly presented itself as a seminar class where you just read and discuss AI papers. Several of the papers involved doing mean things to ferrets. But really it was a writing/communication class with Winston giving you life advice. I remember one of his teachings was how to build and maintain your network (email them ~twice a year). And also before a big lecture you can warm up your voice by making a barking noise. He also brought donuts to most every class. I miss you professor Winston.

His "humans have only one language processor" point has really stuck with me after watching this a few years ago. It's so true.

Related, but I thought there had been larger threads - anyone?

How to Speak [video] - https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=39670484 - March 2024 (2 comments)

How to Speak - https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=31489765 - May 2022 (2 comments)

How to Speak (MIT OCW) [video] - https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=30046076 - Jan 2022 (1 comment)

How to speak (2018) [video] - https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=23878328 - July 2020 (5 comments)

How to Speak by Patrick Winston - https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=23570443 - June 2020 (1 comment)

How to Speak (2018) [video] - https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=22848034 - April 2020 (43 comments)

Also related:

Patrick Winston has died - https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=20482768 - July 2019 (81 comments)

> Your success in life will be determined largely by your ability to speak, your ability to write and the quality of your ideas, in that order.

Ah, the good old days.

Patrick Winston also wrote a book about presentation and communication: Make It Clear: Speak and Write to Persuade and Inform. It was published a year after he passed away.

https://www.amazon.com/Make-Clear-Speak-Persuade-Inform/dp/0...

I'm slowly figuring out that these types of non-interactive, live presentations are unnecessary.

If I'm going to listen a someone speak without me being able to respond/interact/have a conversation with them, it can be recorded and I can watch it whenever is convenient for me.

I feel this way with work presentations too -- record them, and let me watch them anytime. Don't make me sit and listen to someone (or a group of people) give a lecture, so that I have to follow along live.

If I'm watching a recording, there's a far greater chance that I'll actually absorb the content, as a) it'll be during a time that works for me, not some arbitrary scheduled time that may or may not interrupt other things that are distracting me from the presentation, b) I'll be able to rewind if -- no, when -- I zone out for a minute, and c) I can skip/speed up the parts that aren't as relevant to me.

I wish we would move away from these live lectures/presentations, and more to async/recorded sessions.

(As a bonus, it also makes the speaking/presenting side easier, as it can be edited, if desired.)

He says not to start with a joke, but he delivers this line as a joke (and the class laughs). So now I don't know whether to start with a joke or not!

Phenomenal talk.

I had summarized this talk here: https://muratbuffalo.blogspot.com/2020/01/how-to-speak-by-pa...

And a couple more pearls from Prof. Winston here as well. https://muratbuffalo.blogspot.com/search?q=winston

I've watched this video a number of times over the years. It's highly recommended.

It's quite rare that I start a 1 hr long youtube video and watch it all the way through at 1x speed without getting distracted. The ideas in this talk sell themselves.

As a Communication PhD, this video is better than an intro to public speaking course I taught as a graduate student at a top public university.

I initially didn’t remember but as soon as he started writing I remembered him. He is the reason I write in all caps on the paper. I watched his AI course like 10 years ago or so and learned a lot! I thought he looked familiar but just because I initially thought this is a different type of course I just didn’t think of that AI course.

I read in the comments that he is passed away, god bless him.

I can't really bring myself to watch recordings of speeches. I feel like, when you're making an actual speech or lecture, you benefit from slower pace because the audience can't rewind in case they miss something, probably they have lots of distractions, not to mention being physically uncomfortable in a slight but annoying manner for one reason or another. Meanwhile when making video content or even a podcast, it's better to be fast-paced, because there's a decent chance you have the audience's full undivided attention in a place where they feel most comfortable with zero distractions (sofa at night with maximum brightness TV), and even if they miss something, they can rewind, or pause, or whatever.

The pinned link regarding his work and remembrances in YouTube has link rot.

Thankful I could learn a bit more about him here: https://web.archive.org/web/20220707071624/https://www.memor...

Maybe it's just me but I found it hard to follow and not very engaging. He doesn't seem to come across as an excellent speaker in this.

I took 6.034 from Winston and still have the lecture notes and book. Though dated, they remind me of what was great about MIT. The constant change, upheaval, search for scientific truth, and desire to help humankind. RIP Patrick Winston.

I had to rewatch his point about stage fright at the end several times before I finally got it

I like how his talk involves lots of "nesting". (Not sure the correct word for it.) Like, he sets something up then pays it off 5 minutes later. He makes me think of a watchmaker.

We're so lucky we get to watch stuff like this for free these days.

endorse this watch for developing leaders

His high breathing is unnerving, though it could be caused by some lung condition.

warning :)

i thought the standard (mba presentation) format was something like:

tell em what youre goin to tell em (intro)

tell em what you said youll tell em (body)

tell em what you told em (outro)

does anyone else copy-paste the entire thread into LLM and ask for a one paragraph summary of the thread with most extreme points of view?