Saturday Night Live’s Weekend Update sideswiped iPhone network problems last night, the latest in a series of mainstream reporting on the issue:

“It was reported this week that Google would soon launch its own cellphone as a challenge to the iPhone. Also a challenge to the iPhone? Making phone calls.”

Whether AT&T is to blame, or some combination of how AT&T’s network and the iPhone work together, we don’t know. While AT&T was content to increase data revenue while decreasing infrastructure investment all in the name of shareholder value, it’s perversely harder to ignore bad publicity than it is unhappy customers.

Silly video; telling comment. I was surprised, shocked that the NYT seemed to be on the AT&T bandwagon last Sunday with its article claiming it was the iPhone, not the AT&T network that was the cause of such crummy coverage. Follow the link for short entertaining clip from SNL.

You could Tweet all the highlights of 2009 and still have time for dithering. But to catalog the lingo? It would be like one long torture memo. We need to impose a timetable. Let’s get right to our full plate.

The list of buzzwords for 2009 from the Times. Not working any more has made me miss more of these than I could otherwise imagine. Strange to feel so far out of touch.

This video leaves me grasping for words, which is not exactly the desired effect. Remarkable for the knowledge, the thought, and the presentation (both the writing and the delivery. How do you suppose he works with that laptop at his feet?) Where was James Geary when I was in grad school.

Referred on Twitter by Denise Graveline, @dontgetcaught

You may not like to speak in public. You may fret over your delivery, voice, outfit, the lighting. Or perhaps you're a happy speaker, ever willing and comfortable. But when your topic or subject creates the difficulty, you're facing the great equalizer, the challenge that might thwart both the confident and the shy speaker.

And the definition of "tough topic" rests with you, the speaker. It may be tough for you personally--the eulogy of a parent who's died, or the toast to a child on her wedding day. It may be tough for you as a speaker, if you face a contentious topic or audience that might explode, or if you're especially nervous. Tough can be a momentary but pointed political debate, an argument impossible to win, your nerves about the topic, the circumstances of the day and more. So how to plan and prepare? Here are five ways to take the plunge:

Here's some valuable advice for speakers with a tough topic to deal with. (I remember hearing a few Toastmasters presentations in which the speakers had precisely this challenge.) Click through for five suggestions from Denise Graveline.