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Tenmîrt! That confirms what I heard from others, that the languages are rather different. But it does surprise me somehow, given the geographical proximity of the groups of speakers of Berber languages. Of course I don't know the history of the Berber languages though - at what time they started to separate into diverse languages and so on. Is there some hypothesised Proto-Berber (that all Berber languages are descendents of)?

Berber is really dialectical. I can speak really well with people less than 100km from my village. Past that I understand less and less the farther I get away. In Azilal, Berber is a good mix between Tamazight and TashlHit. I can understand tashlHit speakers from around merakesh, agadir, and essaouira alright. I don't understand everything though, but basic conversations are no problem. Pronunciation is the same generally, verb conjugations seem to be the same. Grammar structure is very similar. Some times there will be different prepositions and conjunctions. For example there are different words for "that", as in "the man that ran", but they are both used in exactly the same way. Vocab changes too. For example the words for cow, road, here, to have, to be tired, and to be adapted are different. I have a harder time with Tamazight speakers north of me. Pronunciation changes a bit.  Sh's change to k's, and g's change to y's...sometimes.  Vocab changes too. As for the Rif, I can't understand anything they say there. 

I watch the Berber news with my eyes glazed over most of the time too.

Aah, I hadn't seen your answer before, Hammu, thanks a lot! It seems a very curious situation. So on the news, what variety is used? And which is the one you speak, Hammu?

Now that's complex . Well I guess it is for any language, really, but where languages are standardised (or maybe rather, in the case of national languages) there tend to be a common standard to which most people are exposed, so lack of mutual intelligibility is not so dramatic.