A talk was closely relevant to a problem which had no breakthrough for a long time, but the speaker didn't seem to know a recently new method which is proved be able to solve it yet. What should I do?
I was not a researcher, relative young comparing to the large amount of attendees, and this was the first time I attend an international conference all by myself. Whether the audience interacted with me or not, they could always notice me as I was the smallest person sitting in the front row (for note taking, the rest of rows didn't have table) in between old, big/tall Western professors. Not to mention my broken English.
I had asked the speaker if he knew any new method to solve the problem or not, and he said no. I think he and the audience did have an interest to hear it (I could even mention some leading names working on it), and I know that most of them didn't really care what I mention above at all, but still with that much pressure I didn't have enough confidence to say. Since the new method comes from a completely different field, it might take a couple minutes to explain it. The longer I talked the more embarrassed and tongue-tied I was. In the end I thanked him and asked no more question.
I know that everyone has their first time, but what is your advice in this exact situation? What would you do to feel relief yourself? The impact of the newfound knowledge is big, and yet I'm a non-researcher. That pressure is not an easy thing for an inexperienced person to handle.