teen buzz

The mosquito ringtone, which is a ringtone geared toward especially high frequencies that only young people can hear is really catching on in schools, clubs, or other places where children and teens want to use cell phones surreptitiously. This type of ringtone is also called the “adult proof ringtone” and with good reason.

The range of human hearing starts to fade for most of us around age 20, while teens retain the ability to hear the highest pitch of sound in the normal human range. What this means is that most teens can hear sounds that 90% of adults simply can’t hear at all. Even if adults can perceive the sound, it generally registers as a slight pressure in the head, or as a soft popping noise. Turning this sound into a ringtone means that children and teens can hear phone calls and incoming text messages, without a teacher or parent being aware.

“So what not just put the phone on vibrate?” Some ask, after learning about mosquito ringtones. After all, it seems sort of complicated to assign a non-audible ringtone, when a vibrate function would be just as good. Teens know the answer to this. When vibrate is turned onto a phone, it’s still audible – especially if it has something to vibrate against, like a desk or a book. The beauty of the mosquito ringtone is that it doesn’t vibrate, and can’t be heard at all by anyone who is significantly older.

Still there’s a lot of skepticism about how well these ringtones really work. If a kid can hear it, what about a parent with exceptional hearing?

The truth is that up to 90% of adults can’t hear sounds between 18-20 khz, while up to 70% of those younger than the age of 17 can. This means that there are very good odds of ensuring that a mosquito ringtone audible to a teen won’t be heard by an adult. Of course, there will always be some rare exceptions, but there’s a good chance that someone using a mosquito ringtone will be able to use it in secret.

The beauty of a ringtone that adults can hear is also that they are not expecting it. When adults can hear a high pitched frequency, they often assume it’s due to fluorescent lighting, or to an old TV or computer monitor. These kinds of monitors did once emit high pitched noises, before largely being phased out in favor of flat panel LCDs. This means that even if an adult can hear a mosquito ringtone, they will have a very hard time determining its origin, or knowing that it’s coming from a cellular phone. This gives children and teens a huge advantage.

So do mosquito ringtones work? They absolutely do. Still, it’s a good idea to test out a range of pitches and frequencies to ensure that the tones you can hear are really inaudible to the older people around you.

Ringtones only teens can hear?

There is some good news for everyone looking for a way to receive calls and text messages without the telltale ring of your phone or the annoyance of the vibrator function. The answer is Mosquito Ringtones.

In a weird, but unfortunate, twist of fate, the older we get, the more our hearing declines. As we age, we are unable to hear certain frequencies. The older we get, the more of these frequencies don’t register with our hearing. Somebody much smarter than I, figured out how to put this information to good use and developed the concept of Mosquito Ringtones.

In simple terms, it is possible to download a variety of ringtones that are inaudible to parents, teachers or partners. These ringtones are developed by ‘age range.’ In other words, it is possible to download a ringtone that anyone over the age of 60 will be unable to hear. Other age categories include 50, 40 and 30. As you can imagine, this really opens up the world of texting!

It is a great idea to test these ringtones out before putting them to use. While it is true that as ‘a rule’ the ringtones cannot be heard by the specified age groups, there is always an exception to the rule. In some cases, the tones may still be audible. Luckily, if one tone is still audible, it is likely that the next higher tone will not be. Keep trying and you will find one that works.

These new ringtones are already a hit with teenagers. Typically bound by ‘no phone’ rules in school, and often afraid that even the ‘vibrating’ function of their phone will be heard many teenagers have been searching for a way to still text in school without getting caught. Until technology is developed allowing teachers to someone discern these inaudible tones, teenagers are now free to send and receive text at will.

Mosquito Ringtones

To make matters even better, there are several sites that offer these ringtones for free. Easy to install and even easier to use, free mosquito ringtones are quickly becoming more popular than even the latest ‘hot’ song.

Parents and teachers do have one line of defense. Instead of relying on their ears, they must learn to rely on their eyes – an ironic twist. Once again, teenagers seem to have the upper hand. Their ability to text at lightening fast speeds and often to carry on conversations at the same time means there is little chance they will be caught.

While Mosquito Ringtones have becoming an almost overnight sensation among teenagers or employees looking for a way to keep their texting ability alive, others are not so happy about them! Teachers, parents and managers may soon come to rue the day they were invented.

Free Mosquito Ringtones are a great way to keep texting during school, work or any other time cell phone use is frowned upon. Download one today and keep texting away.

If you are planning on getting a new phone (like the new iPhone or Palm) or perhaps you have already upgraded your phone and you have an old phone laying around; you can recycle that old phone and get paid cash for doing so! For some cell phone models, you can still get good recycling rates!

Recycle your old cell phone for cash!

At the time of this article, the going rates for recycling popular cell phones are:

iPhone: $98-320
BlackBerry: up to $240
Palm: up to $175

The smartphones/PDAs are the phones worth the most money to recyclers, but even older flip phones still have value! It’s best to check the website to see how much your old phone is actually worth.

Recycle Cell Phones

Free Mosquito Ringtones supports cell phone recycling! Please recycle your old cell phone for money and help the environment!

And, of course, you can change your ringtone to be one that you want to hear when the calls are coming in. When you’re one of the millions of BlackBerry users, your ringtone may be the only thing that separates you from the crowd. Luckily, there are an almost infinite number of Internet sites that can help you put the perfect ringtone for your personality on your BlackBerry device.

A recent Google search for BlackBerry ringtones yielded over a million results, most of them confusing. There are thousands of websites that proclaim free ringtones, and most of them just don’t provide what you’re looking for, ringtones for your BlackBerry.

Instead of wasting time, sifting through all those websites that proclaim to have BlackBerry ringtones, we’ve compiled a few lists that should be able to make your hunt for that perfect ringtone easier. First there’s the free ringtones, unlimited ringtones (subscription services and pay per use), and ringtone software that will allow you to make your own ringtones from just about any audio file.

Free BlackBerry Ringtones

• The official BlackBerry site has an area where you can browse ringtones, it must be accessed from your BlackBerry device. Some cost money, but there is a free section that provides a bunch of free ones. They may not be the greatest ringtones, but at least you know no one’s going to slap you with a lawsuit for using them and they are free!
• One recently popular site for BlackBerry ringtones has been Tuneusin.com. There, you will find a large library of free ringtones that you can save and use on your BlackBerry. In addition, it offers a program that allows you to make ringtones from your own music files. However, this program isn’t free; it costs $14.99, which is similar to the costs involved with similar ringtone creation programs.
• CyZeal is a popular program that allows you to access free content one a peer to peer network for a variety of mobile devices. It’s similar to download clients like Kazaa and Limewire, but it is dedicated solely to mobile ringtones, mobile games, graphics and more. It may not be the best service out there, but again, it’s free, and certainly worth checking into to see if you can find something you like.
• Crackberry also has a good variety of free ringtones. Many of these cannot be found elsewhere, which is nice because CrackBerry lacks the mainstream selections than some other BlackBerry ringtone sites offer. They provide what many have called the best “phone ringing” ringtone ever heard (it’s like something out of a Bugs Bunny cartoon). The only downside is that the ringtones aren’t labeled very well and lack decent descriptions, making it a bit tougher to find exactly what you’re looking for.
• Let’s not forget you can also get our very own Mosquito Ringtones FREE for your BlackBerry, just visit our ringtone download page for all the details and follow the instructions.

Ringtone Pay Sites

if you want an amazingly large selection of BlackBerry ringtones, you’ll probably have to use a subscription service. The good news is that unlike ringtone sites for most mobile phones where you have to pay-per-tone, BlackBerry ringtones are available in an unlimited format. Just pay an up-front fee, and have access to more ringtones that your phone will know what to do with.

Here are just a few of your choices for subscription based ringtone providers:

• Jamster is a great resource for Ringtones for your BlackBerry. For only $9.99 a month you get access to the ringtones from thousands of artists. The tones are the real songs and not just midi type files. If your BlackBerry has video capabilities, you can also get video tones from Jamster!
• BlackBerry Ring Tone Megaplex is considered to be a top site in this category. It offers a selection of over 1,000 different ringtones. They are updated frequently, and a subscription of only $19.95 lasts for a whole year.
• Funtonia is a large ringtone site that has over 450,000 ringtones in their library. They charge $23.88 for a year of access. However, they have a plan for people who don’t want the whole year: $17.97 for three months of access.

Create Your Own Ringtones

One of the greatest advancements in ringtone technology has been the ability for users to make their own ringtones from any music library with the aid of websites or ringtone creator software. While most of these services and programs are fee-based, it could be worth it for people who like to change their ringtones regularly.

To watch a detailed video that provides instructions on how to take any mp3 file on the Internet and convert it into a ringtone for your BlackBerry, visit How to add free ringtones to your BlackBerry.

• BlackBerryTunes.com offers an Internet-based way to create ringtones from your mp3s. You can upload your songs to the site, convert and edit them, and then put them on your BlackBerry as a ringtone. Choose any portion of a song, upload it, edit it, and you have your ringtone. The service costs $29.99 for four months of unlimited access. It’s best for those who want to convert a lot at once.
  After that, there are a variety of programs that allow you to make the song to ringtone conversion right from your desktop. They’re all similar and differ by how much the program does (conversion, editing, wallpaper, etc.), and the price.
• The Ringtone Maker – The cost is $16.49, and it offers creation and editing services.
• DJ Tone Xpress – It’s almost the same as The Ringtone Maker, same features and price ($16.95). A free trial is available
• Kylix Ringtone Maker – Offers conversion and editing for $19.95. However, there is a way you can get it for free if you can get an article published in a renowned Internet or print source, or can translate a help file to one of the languages they support. If you happy to be a writer or blogger, this is definitely worth it as you can end up getting it free.
• Ringtone Media Studio – This program not only allows you convert and edit your mp3 files, it also allows you to compose your own custom ringtones. The software also offers wallpaper and screensaver creation, and a video editor.
• RingFactory – This offers one of the cheapest solutions to creating ringtones at just $9.95, but that’s just for the conversion part of the program. There are additional program bundles available that can allow you to rip DVDs to your computer or iPod.

There are many great times to use the free ringtones, like when vibrate might still be heard or rattle something in your bag. Show all your friends your new cell phone and show them your mosquito ringtone too!

After clicking the link, a feed will appear in your podcast folder in iTunes.

Click on the arrow next to the Podcast to display all of the ringtones.

Click the frequency of the ultra sonic ring tone that you want to put on your iPhone, or select them all!

And finally, your ringtones should appear in your ringtones folder. If a ringtones folder does not appear, connect your iPhone to your computer

Your ringtones will be available on your iPhone the next time you sync it with iTunes.

I am not sure if it something to do with the encoding built into Audacity or with the software on the iPhone itself. Either way, they are working now on the iPhone through the Safari browser and through the media player.

First I went to the source for Teen Buzz on my iPhone to see how the website works and if the files would play in the Safari browser, and of course they do (you have to use the direct mp3 link — green download buttons. No flash player for the iPhone yet).

The Bad News

It appears that the iPhone is limited to somewhere between 14khz and 15khz as the 15khz tone does not play correctly on the iPhone. Perhaps Apple did this purposely to prevent people from using higher pitched ringtones, to prevent damage to the phone’s internal speakers and/or people’s ears!? I can’t find any references to the capabilities of the speaker in the iPhone itself or to any studies about the long term affects of hearing mosquito ringtone like sounds for any lenght of time.

If you want to use the 14khz tone, which most people 50 and younger can hear, you will still need a third party ringtone application for the iPhone, as Apple prevents you from using any ringtones on the device except those that you buy from iTunes.

Does anyone have any more specific information out there about speaker capabilites on the iPhone and why things over 14khz will not play? Please share your thoughts and comments! After this Easter break I will have time to figure out the exact high range limitation of the iPhone. I will also release results on whether this is a hardware or software limitation.

Update: You can view my update to this here: iPhone Speaker information