Nielsen stats put the average teen’s texting rate at about ten per hour during the day. This, and basic math, leads to some terrifying conclusions! For example : Nielsen says that this rate of texting results in somewhere over 3000 text per month, per teen, on average. This means that nearly half of every day is texting time for these people, which, assuming they sleep at all , means that they’re either texting steadily all day, or a ton during after-school hours. And let’s say these texts average out to about 80 characters, which is half the maximum length for a text message: Even if the average word length is very generous five characters (that’s six, including a space), these kids are tapping out about 40,000 words of ephemeral nothingness every month, or roughly one Catcher in the Rye ’s worth of “WILL UR BRTHR BUY US SUM BEER?” and “R U REDDY 2 DO IT YET?” every two months. What happens when these people get old?

Sixteen-year-old Alexander Kendrick has put together a low-frequency radio which allows for the transmission of text messages from caves nearly 1,000 feet underground. I still can’t get a single bar of reception on the subway. Aside from updating Twitter with messages of “It’s dark in here” while spelunking, Kendrick’s science fair-winning cave-texting device could actually help save lives. Underground rescues in caves or mines are time consuming and dangerous ventures because of the rescue teams’ inability to communicate well—unless they lay down miles of telephone line as a rescue team in new Mexico once did. With this cave-texting system, rescuers would be able to maintain contact and potentially get medical aid where it’s needed a heck of a lot faster. Of course Kedrick’s project isn’t the first cave radio , but its test was actually “the deepest known underground digital communication ever to take place in the United States.” I hope the text was “Hello World.” [ NPR via Slashdot via Make ]

For all the talk of sexting, you’d think it was the only kind of text out there. Not so! There’s plenty of other ways to message, most of which come with just as much regret: Becksting: Texting after one too many fine imported lagers Sectsting: Blasts to give your cult to-the-minute updates on Xenu’s ETA Flexting: A picture message that doubles as an Admit One to the gun show Anorexting: Updating your friends on calorie counts and Weight Watchers points Hexting: Sending bad juju via SMS T. Rexting: Sending out obscure lyrics from 70s glam-rock bands Dexting: Sharing your Dexter fan fiction, 160 characters at a time Treksting: Spending an hour creating the perfect ASCII Vulcan salute

Or, if you count multitasking—which is just the kind of hysterical, stat-juicing thing you would do if you were running a study like this—nearly 11 hours a day. That doesn’t leave a lot of time for fresh air. Even with out including multitasking hours, the Kaiser Family Foundation study shows that kids these days are watching TV, texting, or on the internet 7.5 hours each and every day. That’s an hour more than in 2004, and an even bigger jump since 1999. Basically, if they’re awake and not in school, they’re staring at a screen.

Forget the grisly effects of texting while driving for a moment, if you can. Instead, focus on a new epidemic, one that’s admittedly much sillier than the driving one, but no less dangerous. Ladies and gents, meet texting while walking: Slightly more than 1,000 pedestrians visited emergency rooms in 2008 because they got distracted and tripped, fell or ran into something while using a cellphone to talk or text. That was twice the number from 2007, which had nearly doubled from 2006, according to a study conducted by Ohio State University, which says it is the first to estimate such accidents. [ New York Times ] Yes, folks, the situation is so bad that there are now studies on it. There are reports of concussions, sprained ankles and broken appendages, not to mention the countless number of people who hurt nothing but their pride by walking into a parked car and never went to an ER (happens all the time, apparently).

Showcasing the “fastest, most accurate” text messengers (according to the corporation that dreamed up this little publicity stunt), the LG Mobile World Cup Championship went down yesterday at Gotham Hall in New York City. We’re proud to say that the American team fared well — grabbing second place and winning $20,000 in the process — although in the end the cup went to South Korea. Additionally, history was made when Portugal’s Pedro Matias set the new World’s Record for texting by typing a 264-character text in just 1 minute 59 seconds (besting the previous record by 23 seconds). Of course, each Mobile World Cup must have its share of controversy — in this case, Engadget Mobile’s very own Chris Ziegler led a silent protest during the awards ceremony. The group was reportedly upset over the use of QWERTY phones (the LG enV3 in this case) to break the record. “The only true test of texting skill is a numeric keypad, without T9,” he said

I know there is a tradition to uphold, and I enjoyed the movie, but groundhog texting? Do they even have thumbs? Of course, the idea is to get the word out to the millions of crazy people out there that rely on a talking groundhog to predict the weather. If you are one of those people, text “Groundhog” to 247365. You will receive a reply on February 2nd. And, the good news is that Phil is fluent in both “groundhog-ese” and English, so you will have no problem absorbing his wisdom.

Taser, not content just helping cops electrocute old people and the handicapped, has decided to focus some of its energy on stopping sexting and texting while driving. Not with electrocution, sadly. The tech itself is pretty ho-hum: it lets parents monitor texts and control when they can use their phone. Why the hell they’re doing this when they normally make, you know, tasers, is beyond me. But hey, power to you, Taser.

Everyone knows that stroking a beard helps you think. And there are few beards more majestic than James Lipton’s. So it makes sense that LG is using said beard to promote responsible texting in these actually-amusing ads. Come on, admit it. You can’t resist Lipton

Meet the Texminator. It’s an arcade cabinet that tests your texting speed. It was also inevitable. Seriously now, my youngest sister has a phone she never uses—save for texting.