How to distribute and protect your powerpoint presentations
You have spent HOURS on your presentation, now you want to distribute and share it.
How do you make sure everyone can view it without reusing the content?
Convert it to a pdf?
It might work, but you'll lose all animations and the effects like shadows will look like crap.
Save it as a .pps ?
Forget it. It's just a matter of changing the extension to .ppt and you're back to status quo.
You can password protect it in PowerPoint 2007 and 2003, but the people with Macs or earlier versions of PowerPoint can't open it, not to forget people without PowerPoint (yes, they exist).
The best method I've come across is to convert it into flash. It has several advantages:
1. Everyone can view it
A flash file can be viewed in all internet browsers. People with linux, macs, iPhones, PDAs, smart phones and other handheld devices can view your presentation; even people without PowerPoint.
2. Great protection
It's impossible for people to modify your work.
3. Reduced file size
When you convert your PowerPoint to flash, the file size will be reduced to a 1/10 of the original file size.
4. Perfect for email
If you want to send a PowerPoint file to someone by email, converting it to flash is a good option. The file size is smaller and you keep all of your transitions and effects (if you use the options I suggest below).
I hope you are convinced.
There are many options to convert your PowerPoint into flash. Here are my favorites:
iSpring Flash Converter
This is a simple add-in to PowerPoint (only for windows). It lets you convert you powerpoint into an swf file with one click. And you don't lose any animations or effects. They have a pro version, which makes you customize the flash player with logo, colors etc. ($249). The free version is good, but it's kind of annoying that they have an iSpring logo appearing at the bottom.
Pros: Really easy to use and install, reduces file size drastically.
Cons: Disturbing logo and navigation bar at the bottom (only free version).
PPT2FLASH
This is basically the same as iSpring's solution, but it looks much better. You'll have to pay for this one, but try out the trial version and see if you like it.
Pros: Easy to use and install, the end-result is really great.
Cons: Cost $199
I tested both of solutions - here's how the same presentation looks in both solutions:
iSpring Free:
http://slideshop-files.s3.amazonaws.com/ispring/index.html
PPT2FLASH:
http://slideshop-files.s3.amazonaws.com/ppt2flash/index.html
Good luck distributing and protecting presentations in the future,
Tobias