Better Neighbors Through Technology

We recently read a Wall Street Journal about new technology inventions to keep people from disturbing each other. One inventor had come up with an electrically-charged coat to keep "gropers" at bay while riding the subway in New York. Another had designed a device which emitted an ultrasonic shriek designed to quiet the neighbor's dog when he starts barking (he disguised it as a birdhouse for good measure). Our "invention with the most potential" was a FM transmitter and iPod combination used to silence noisy radios during taxi and bus rides...the inventor had a track of recorded silence on his iPod, and used the FM transmitter, designed to allow your iPod to play through your car stereo, to inflict a silence track on cabbies playing their radio too loud. We look forward to the next level of this invention, using white noise generators to drown out boom cars and loud mufflers as they pass by your house or business.

They used to say "good fences make good neighbors." Technology may make those fences a lot smaller.