I personally prefer when slides show what is being talked about, instead of just summarizing the speaker's points. My problem is, I can't read the text on the slides and listen to the speaker talking at the same time.
The way I try to do it is to use slides for code examples or charts, and then discuss them as they're shown, highlighting the relevant areas. I try to include pauses there, so that people have time to focus on the image without me talking. When audience size is small enough and isn't transient (e.g. a small lecture, not a conference), I give out handouts with the code & charts from slides printed on real paper - paper is much higher resolution than the screen, and it helps the people further out in the room to stay engaged.
Any time I build a high-stakes presentation that uses slides only for visuals, higher-ups coach me into putting the text back in. They frame this feedback in two ways:
a) The listener may zone out and lose track of what you're saying. The slides should be there to pull them back in. Otherwise you risk losing them completely.
b) The slide deck as a standalone artifact is expected to communicate the substance of the talk. No one is going to watch the video. But my skip lead, your promotion committee reviewers, etc. will probably flip through the slides. If it's a mystery what they're looking at, that's not good.
> The slide deck as a standalone artifact is expected to communicate the substance of the talk.
Curiously, this is the exact opposite of most advice for delivering public speeches (then again, most of that advice is for sales talks, not informative talks, so one has to filter it anyway). Slides aren't suited for effectively communicating a message outside of the context of a talk; at that point, it's better to just write a document. But I imagine the "principle of least effort" is what leads to slides being used the way you described in b).
Public speeches are about making listeners feel good about your speech so you get hired to speak again. They are not meant to convince or teach and no part of it matters for the future.
I would think people become less susceptible to such parasites over time. I mean, I've outgrown listening to TED talks years ago. At some point you have to realize that the speaker only making you feel good is just wasting your time.
The way I try to do it is to use slides for code examples or charts, and then discuss them as they're shown, highlighting the relevant areas. I try to include pauses there, so that people have time to focus on the image without me talking. When audience size is small enough and isn't transient (e.g. a small lecture, not a conference), I give out handouts with the code & charts from slides printed on real paper - paper is much higher resolution than the screen, and it helps the people further out in the room to stay engaged.