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?'"

Comments

Re:A shorter history of ringtones

[BubbleDragon]

*shudders* And it's even worse with someone non-technical driving the whole thing.

Last night at a restaurant, a woman in about her late 40s stopped the waitress every time she passed, asking about how to save this, or what's this mean, and "Get this bird off my screen!" Then she proceeded to scroll through every different ring tone possibility at the highest volume for 20 minutes. All the while grinning, and oblivious to the concept that everyone else in the place had adopted a bit of a nervous tick.

And they bitch about my generation being socially inept.

Re:Ringtones are one of the dumbest things to pay

[slashkitty]

Tell me about it. I thought noone actually would buy them. However, it ends up that it's easy to buy, just enter a few sms numbers, and it gets tacked onto your cellphone bill.

I just started a ringtones on my site last month. I've already sold over 3000 ringtones in over 50 countries. I'd say that ringtone sales are going strong.

Re:The sound of silence

[sg3000]

> At the very most, they might hear my phone's vibration

My phone is always in vibrate mode, unless it's plugged into a wall charger and stuck on my dresser for the night. I can think of few things more annoying or unprofessional than an obtrusive ring tone.

One person at work I knew believes she is a Very Important Person, but she didn't want to carry her phone on her (too bulky, I assume). So she turned up the ringer to a distinctive song set to its loudest volume and put the damn thing on vibrate. When the phone went off, the cacophony of noises would be accompanied by the phone vibrating so violently that it would start whirling around the desk like a dervish. All conversation would stop as people would stared shocked at her cell phone.

For teenagers, I guess it's fine to use obnoxious ring tones -- it's probably analogous to people of my generation in college having annoying answering machine messages with popular songs or samples from a TV show (ho ho! My answering machine message is George from Seinfeld singing "Believe it or not, George isn't at home") or something.

Re:I am baffled.

[DeckardJK]

Maybe its because people like to have a little fun. Sure... we could all use the same ringtone and life would be great, however; there is a little enjoyment to be gained out of hearing your friend's cellphone crank out ZZ Top's "Sharp Dressed Man" or something else kinda funny.

I know ringtones in certain places are annoying... but its beyond me how links to pictures of souped up computers on /. are the coolest thing ever, however; when it comes to pop culture and fashion anything other than the bare minimum is deemed unneccesary or too trendy.

Re:I am baffled.

[SnprBoB86]

"I guess it's the same people that blare their radio in the car with the windows rolled all the way down."

That is an interesting comment...

Personally, I hate ringtones, but I love to rock out real loud with the wind pouring in the windows on a nice fall or spring day.

The difference is that when I get to a red light, I lower the volume.

I guess it's the same people who leave their phone on loud durring a meeting who don't lower their radio when it could be annoying other people.