Observations after Apple's keynote

Through a series of live bloggers and buffering live streams I managed to catch most of Apple's keynote yesterday (you can now watch the Apple keynote video here). The presentation covered a lot and dot all is relevant for presentation design. Here are some points that struck me.

• A move to more minimalist productivity applications. First Internet browsers started cutting screen clutter, now it is the turn of other applications. The new Lion operating system will have a standard full screen mode into it.
• A move away from the file system that was created in the 1980s, where you had to remember file names, locations, worry about saving frequently, and make sure not to overwrite versions. The iCloud syncing service will make files available on all connected devices. Lion seems to support a sophisticated version management system so you do no to saving your files with extension 1, 2, 3, etc. (does it only work in iWork or also in Microsoft Office?), and applications now remember how you left things when you closed them down.
• A move back to keyboard and touchpad short cuts. Back in the 1990s I would know almost all keyboard short cuts available. With the advent of the mouse, I forgot all of them, just using arrow keys and mouse clicks. That is changing again. More and more menu navigation is going through short cuts.

It was interesting to see how the whole presentation still worked well despite a reduced role of Steve Jobs. Good slide design, careful script writing, and practice-practice-practice turns everyone into a great presenter.