A little tip for cunning tech publicists out there in the ether: now's the time to get out the bad news. In politics, Friday afternoons, when reporters are already wrapping up for the weekend, have long been the preferred time to bury a story. The evening before a holiday is even better: Kissinger's appointment to lead the 9/11 commission, a controversial choice, was disclosed the afternoon before Thanksgiving. So what's this got to do with anything? Well, tomorrow is the equivalent of a Friday afternoon, Thanksgiving and the return of the Messiah — rolled into one — for the tech industry. The triumphant release of the iPhone, the Mac cultists trampled to death in a mad rush to get limited supplies of the Apple wonderphone: neither readers nor reporters will be paying attention to any other story, no matter how juicy and damaging. So, if you have a product that needs to be put out of its misery, with minimal fuss, go for it. N-Gage? Yahoo Search? Microsoft Vista? Suggestions, in the comments.

Contact information for this author is not available.