How do you lock elements in a Powerpoint page so they cant be moved?

Do you have anything to contribute to this discussion?

Or are you just here to hurl abuse at the volunteers who are trying to help solve another user's problem?  Let me emphasize that:  *volunteers*, NOT Microsoft employees, though rudeness is rudeness, no matter at whom it's directed.

Its' not clear whether you're using a Mac or PC version of PowerPoint; the latter, I expect, since that's what you indicated you use when you posted on the Windows side of the forum.  

In PPT 2013, you can use the Selection Pane to turn off visibility of shapes that are in the way of what you're doing;  invisible shapes can't be selected, so you can't accidentally select and move them.

Or you can directly select the shape you want to work with.

it's been a while, since this thread started, but i wanted to add a possible solution, just to make sure:

in case you need to lock shapes (amongst other things), you might want to check out this add-in:

http://officeone.mvps.org/shapelocker/shapelocker.html

i have absolutely no idea why microsoft is unwilling to integrate this feature, it sure would make things easier.

anyhow, i installed the trial version and it really works.

hope that helps.

I work on PowerPoint daily. 

What I didn't quite get the first time I read the question is what view the lock-down is desired. During editing in Normal View? When the slide show plays? In Master views?

It sounds like you want to have a lock-down feature for sharing authoring rights. While you can't block a **coauthor** from editing by slide, slide range, or objects, you can decide who wins when there's a conflict.

When you say "We want THAT feature" you really have to be very specific about how you want "THAT feature" to operate. Once you have decided, as I said before, submit your feature request on the request form so the Microsoft product managers know exactly how you want this to operate. Otherwise, you leave it to them to decide what you mean.