As I am still stuck in dialup land, maybe some of you with an hour to spare can watch Noam Chomsky’s West Point talk and give the group a synopsis.

From the U.S. Military Academy at West Point, Noam Chomsky talks to West Point cadets about just war theory and the invasion of Iraq. During the talk, Professor Chomsky criticizes the work of Michael Walzer, an influential proponent of just war theory and the author of the popular “Just and Unjust Wars.” Following his remarks, Professor Chomsky takes questions from the cadets about international law and the Bush administration’s foreign policy.

From other comments on the web, it seems to have been worthwhile.

This may be old news, but in checking out Slingshot’s story from last night, it turns out that the great Mosquito Ringtone story is actually true.

In that old battle of the wills between young people and their keepers, the young have found a new weapon that could change the balance of power on the cellphone front: a ring tone that many adults cannot hear.

The technology, which relies on the fact that most adults gradually lose the ability to hear high-pitched sounds, was developed in Britain but has only recently spread to America — by Internet, of course.

[snip]

The cellphone ring tone was the offshoot of an invention called the Mosquito, developed last year by a Welsh security company to annoy teenagers and gratify adults, not the other way around.

It was marketed as an ultrasonic teenager repellent, an ear-splitting 17-kilohertz buzzer designed to help shopkeepers disperse young people loitering in front of their stores while leaving adults unaffected.

So I can hear it, but I would be very interested to perform my own study with different people on different computers or cell phones. At any rate, this brings up a couple questions for me:

1) Is the technology gap between generations widening at such a pace that could threaten the status quo and bolster Teen Revolt?

2) What else are humans doing with sound frequency that may be less innocent than discouraging loitering teens or sneaking text messages by aged teachers?

Also, I have to say that I’d much rather kids set their ringer to mosquito than have to hear Super Mario Brothers one more time. Not to mention more inappropriate choices.

Ah, for the days of good old-fashioned wholesome ringtones like these:

Licking an Envelope Ringtone—Again, playing on nostalgia, a real tear-tugger for the baby boomers. The lick-lick sound, then the kweek sound of folding the paper over. I can clearly imagine a cell phone ringing and a stranger nearby saying, “God, is someone actually performing that ancient domestic art of licking an envelope?”