Today, Greg Atkinson asks what, if any, presentation software titles his readers are using. Greg shares the tidbit that 19 of Outreach’s 25 Most Innovative Churches in the US use MediaShout, which surprised me a little bit. I know MediaShout is a good product and I know it stands up well in comparison with competitors like EasyWorship, but I didn’t know it would be favored that heavily by the churches on the list. Of course, an inherent problem with the worship presentation software industry has been price—MediaShout and EasyWorship both retail at around $400, which may seem trivial to large churches but prohibitive to smaller churches. Price is an even bigger factor when you consider that PowerPoint and Keynote (exclusive to Macs) are part of relatively inexpensive productivity software bundles (Microsoft Office and iWork respectively) that most churches purchase anyway. Keynote, even though it might require a learning curve for PowerPoint users, can even do things like play video backgrounds behind text—a feature that PC users can’t get on PowerPoint.
MediaShout’s new Express–which gets a full review in the upcoming debut issue of COLLIDE—may be a good way to bridge this gap. Express retails at $229, which might seem much more palatable to churches who have been hesitant to commit $400+ to improving their presentations. Although the price cut is made possible by some feature cuts, Express still seems like a perfectly viable option for a lot of small to mid-sized churches out there. If you’re already using a worship presentation software title, click on over to Greg’s blog and let him know which one you fancy.