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Short History of Cellphone Ringtones
RobotWisdom writes "This week's New Yorker magazine includes an interesting
short history of cellphone ringtones, including statistics on their (huge) profitability worldwide. My favorite quote: 'I spent three days of productive work time listening to polyphonic ringtone versions of speed metal, trying to find exactly the ringtone that expressed my personality with enough irony and enough coolness that I could live with it going off ten times a day. In a quiet room, in a meeting, this phone's gonna go off-- what are they going to hear?'"
Vibrate.
I mean, $2-3 a PIECE? who the hell pays that? I am quite content with the standard ringer on my LG. It is a damn phone!
Seriously, I do not understand the level of popularity that ringtones have acheived - especially considering that they cost money! A cellphone plan costs enough already. I use a preprogrammed ringtone on my Audiovox CDM-4000 phone (1st gen CDMA for anyone unfamiliar with the particular phone), and while it's a bit cheesy I can instantly recognize that this tone is coming from my phone and my phone only - It's been ringing like this for almost 5 years. If I were to change ring tones often, not only would it be time&money consuming but I would also lose that mental 'training' of what my phone sounds like when it rings in a room full of people with ringing cellphones.
Yes, I do know people who have a ring tone for everyone in their phonebook. Perhaps it is useful to them other than being a fashion statement (since caller ID also identifies incoming callers) but is it really worth paying for?
Everyone else hollering "PUT YOUR FUCKING PHONE ON VIBRATE!"
Damn I hate ringtones.
sulli
RTFJ.
From the proliferation of (what I consider to be) annoying ring tones, I really feel alone in the world with my lowly silent setting.
For the life of me, I can not figure out why someone would take the time to set up a custom ringtone - let alone pay for one.
I guess it's the same people that blare their radio in the car with the windows rolled all the way down.
I'm a big tall mofo.
Which is exactly why I have mine set to vibrate mode. The reality is, during a meeting, nobody gives a shit what kind of music I like. Cell phone use is intrusive enough without the addition of "look how cool I am" ring tones.
Of course I've got a new one to add to rude cell phone use. In a movie theater if you have a bright screen on your phone, cover it with your hand so it doesn't distract other people.
Though on the good side technology is getting to the point where it can effectively block cell phone signals so since it is obvious people won't police themselves it is only a matter of time before more and more public places like movie theaters block it for them.
-- Slashdot, making the Left look conservative since 1997.
Personally I refuse to buy ringtones. If I like a tune, I've probably bought it on CD; why should I pay MORE money to have it on my phone? (Don't tell me, some record industry group thinks I owe them for performance royalties for letting my phone ring in a public place? What if I _promise_ not to take my phone outside my house???)
m ).
.wav & .mp3 files on and use those as ringtones.
Even if you do decide to buy a ringtone, you've then got to hunt around and find somewhere that isn't charging you 5 euros a month for some subscription you didn't even know you were signing yourself up for! (http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/technology/4295625.st
Personally I now stick to phones that you can put
I refuse to pay for ringtones. You go on these sites and most of them are crap anyway. For the large part they are just sound clips from the latest teen gangsta sensation. And they charge, what, $5 a pop for this garbage?
I have a Motorola v551 which is able to interpret general MIDI files and MP3s. Adding ringtones is as simple as jumping on a MIDI archive or ripping one of my CDs, truncating the song down to the part I want, and transferring them to the phone with the data cable.
Buying ringtones is right up there with paying for pr0n in my book.
-R
I'm saying this on behalf of everyone who hates mobile phones.
FUCK OFF!
It's annoying as hell to be talking to someone when they suddenly pick up their phone and cut you off mid sentence. Or you're in a shop and suddenly a phone rings and 12 people dive head first into their bag.
I miss the days of the early 90s where the only people who mobile phones were people who needed them, not every middle age woman and 12 year old girl within a 3 mile radius of the shopping part of town.
I like muppets.
I believe that every cellphone on the planet should have just 1 fixed ringtone that cannot be changed. It should be some guy announcing in a loud and obnoxious voice, "LOOK EVERYONE! I HAVE A CELLPHONE AND I'M AN *ASSHOLE*!" Then most people would keep their cellphone on silent and the issue wouldn't ever come up.
I'm trying to teach myself to set people on fire with my mind... Is it hot in here?
There are websites that have have huge collections of MIDI. There's everything from TV themes to pop music to automated Mozart minuette generators. Grab one, shove it in your phone and begin annoying people immediately. It's just not that hard. $2.00 seems usurious.
John
I find that musical ringtones are personality amplifiers. for that .01% of people that are already cool without a ringtone, a clever ringtone will enhance their attitude. For people like the submitter, having your phone break out a speed metal riff, will reall bring out the fact that you are a pathetic loser who relies on their electronic accessories to define them.
ringtone != cool (if you are reading this, you are not in that sliver of culture that can pull off a ringtone, please, for the love of god, switch to vibrate)
sorry, that is just the way it is.
(for full disclosure, I have my ringtone set to vibrate, since I am not in the top 0.01% of coolness)
My cell phone has a bunch of ring tones, all the crap Samsung added. I use two of them, one is a normal US ringer, the other is vibrate. Most of the time it's set on vibrate.
There are few things more annoying than being out in public listening to some horrible scratchy version of the latest "music" the Top 40 has inflicted on us. Bonus irritation points if you're in the movie theatre (those sort of people need to be tortured without mercy).
Might I suggest "Useful Idiot" by Tool.
In a quiet room, in a meeting, this phone's gonna go off-- what are they going to hear?
Well, in my neck of the woods, if they hear anything other than the gentle buzz of a phone set to vibrate, it'll be the distant sound of your phone shattering into a thousand pieces on the sidewalk four stories below.
I'd gladly pay for a ringtone that actually sounded anything remotely like a telephone ringing. My phone seems to have more songs on it than I care to count, but not one ringtone that sounds remotely like a ringing phone. Unfortunately it's even hard to find good custom ringtones, all the ones I see are usually clips of songs, what happened to having custom sound effects or actual ringing sounds?
So many of you have been saying things like, "For the life of me, I can't understand why anyone would pay $2 to $3 for a 20 second ringtone". Well, here's a newsflash: millions upon millions of people do just that. The reason you can't understand that is because ** you are not the target market **.
Can you understand why someone would buy a new pair of Nike's every month when they only need new shoes once a year? Can you understand why someone would pay $150 for a brand-new basketball jersey when they already have a dozen more sitting in their closet? No? You are not the target market.
For millions of people consumer products suich as cell phones are status symbols; they are conspicuous displays of wealth and popularity. It has little to do with function and everything to do with perception and image. A new ringtone is a cool thing to have not only because it broadcasts to everyone in range that the consumer is in tune with popular music, but also that the consumer has the money to afford a new phone and new ringtone.
You may not get it. but not everyone thinks like you.
"I'd have to pay $50 for an adapter. My only other option is to pay a small fee to use the GetItNow functionality to download straight to my phone via Verizon's network."
WHy not pay a zillion dollars.
Or just get an adapter for your phone for $7. They're available web-wide. I'll assume you know how to use Google at this point?
Yes, I have 3 verizon phones, so I know what I'm talking about.
If you put a planner item in its calender and say
Meeting at 11 for 30min, the phone should auto go to silent mode.
Liberty freedom are no1, not dicks in suits.
People are too dumb to realize this.
I happen to have download my ringtone via GPRS, but this still turned out to be cheaper than anything else.
one beep could be anything and most people arn't even sure they heard it.
Including yourself?
What would Brian Boitano do?