Tech rule #1: Keep the boss away from the buttons…

Jackman – Can You Hear Us Now? (TMZ.com) – “Hugh Jackman and Daniel Craig were trying to perform their play “A Steady Rain” Wednesday night in NYC — but some nitwit forgot to turn off his mobile phone. Jackman set the dude straight — staying in character all the while. Minutes later, the ring tone [...]

Cringing and laughter. Good presentation disaster stories inspire one or the other. Really good presentation disaster stories inspire at least a little of both. This story, from Ian Whitworth’s blog, Can You Hear Me Up the Back?, ping-pongs back and forth from one to the other so often I lost track and ended up laughing [...]

A recent comment on a Reddit posting: At my company, we had some guy from another come in to go over some things with the bosses and a few key people. After his presentation, they turned off the projector, and he whipped out a dry-erase marker and started writing notes on the white board for [...]

Examples of what you might call “unintentional foreshadowing”: We don’t need to tape down that extension cord, no one’s going to be going over there. It’s a brand new projector, why should we spend that much money on a backup bulb. They had a pipe burst the last time we did a meeting there. There’s [...]

Yeah, I know it’s kind of crass to whine and complain during the season of joy, but here are a few things I know a lot of meeting professionals wished Santa had managed to slip into his sack before flying south: A magic coupon for free, fast, robust, ubiquitous Wi-Fi redeemable at any meeting venue. [...]

FAILBlog: Backstage at BackstageJobs.com: Props are important. Screw them up, and someone could die — “An actor at the Vienna National Theatre slit his own throat in front of a packed house when the fake prop knife he was supposed to have was accidentally switched for a real knife.” Face2face: Teleprompter problems — “I know [...]

Do you expect to be attending any important business meetings in the United States this coming Thursday or Friday? I didn’t think so. It’s safe to say a that large percentage of my readers are expecting to spend this Thursday (Thanksgiving) through Sunday eating, drinking, shopping and hanging out with family and friends. However, say [...]

[UPDATE: This post outlines an addition to "The Principles". The post that started it all is here. The most up-to-date version will be maintained at breakingmurphyslaw.com/the-principles/.] A couple weeks ago, when I posted “The Seven Principles of Presentation Disaster Avoidance (Version 0.1 beta)” I knew two things right off the bat (even before all the [...]

[UPDATE: "The Principles" is going to be a living document and will be updated and added to on a regular basis. This post is where it all started and the rationale for the project can be found at the end. The most up-to-date version will be maintained at http://www.breakingmurphyslaw.com/the-principles/.] 1. If you can’t do without [...]