[coffeemug]

I've learned that there is a difference between being a good speaker and being a polished speaker. PG isn't very polished - there are tons of uhms and some inherent awkwardness to his talks, but I still consider him a very good speaker. With his awkwardness on stage comes some natural sense of charisma. The audience laughs, feels engaged, and is glued to the speaker wondering with anticipation what he's going to say next. At the end, everybody is very happy for having heard the talk, and I don't think anyone ever feels bored during it.

I expect with a few lessons it would be fairly easy to add polish to those talks if it becomes necessary (e.g. running for office, etc.)

[jmadsen]

Yes to your first sentence; I'm not sure about the rest.

I couldn't help but feel this essay was in response to an earlier HN thread where his speaking style was criticized a bit for its unpolished nature & being essentially "un-listenable to" on a podcast somewhere.

IF that is the case, then he seems to have missed the point that no matter how much good content you have, if you are so unpolished that you can't deliver the message effectively, you almost may as well not talk.

"no one, uhm, is, uhm, going to, uhm, sit still for, uhm, and hour and a half, of, uhm..."