Comment by hughesjj

^ exactly, thanks for taking the answer perfectly.

It's basically panel 2 from this:

https://xkcd.com/568/

Beyond the initial publication of the doc, the peer review process is much more sane than trying to review a bunch of power point slides. Similarly, it's much much easier to refer to a well written document when it comes time to implement or reevaluate an idea than going over some power point slides and maybe an associated recording, to say nothing about searchability, discoverability, and maintainability of an actual written document vs PowerPoint slides.

Also, idle side speculation: I wonder how much (if any) one of the underappreciated early employees @ Amazon had a hand in proselytizing this, given she (MacKenzie) is an author.