Know Your Mobile Ringtones

Ringtones indicate incoming calls on mobile phones. The term originates from early land telephones that had a ringing mechanism in which a small bell was struck to alert the user of an incoming call. The sound produced was a ringing tone, but modern electronic phones (both land and mobile) can now produce a whole range of sounds from musical samples to animal sounds.

The first mobile phones came with a limited range of pre-programmed ringtones, which mimicked the bell sound that landlines had historically produced. This was elaborated on, and soon most mobile phones came with a range of classical and popular music samples and even chirping ringtones, all programmed into the phones internal memories. In 1998 a Finnish mobile operator (Elisa), began providing a downloadable mobile ring tone service called Harmonium. This meant that people could buy new, non-standard ringtones for their mobile phones, which were then delivered via SMS to the handset. Monophonic ring tones were provided by Harmonium that increased the range and quality of the sounds available, and the service quickly developed into a global, a multi-billion dollar industry.

As the technology in mobile phones has evolved so has that of ringtones. From the monophonic tones of the first downloadable ringtones, new polyphonic tones where developed which could consist of a several notes at a time, enabling users to download clearer and more convincing music samples, and a whole new range of sounds. This was quickly followed by truetone technology, in which full audio samples could be downloaded to mobile phones, (in MP3 or AAC format), such as excerpts from songs or voice samples taken from popular cultural figures, providing users with almost life-like sounding ringtones for their phones.

Some providers now also provide facilities for users to create their own music tones, such as the MusicDJ program in Sony Ericsson phones, and also the latest innovation to come into the market is singtone, which allows users to record their own voice, and mix it into a backing track to create their very own karaoke style ringtone. Paid tones are usually of high quality but the case is not true always and the cost can range from as low as 50 cent ringtones to as high as $10 per tone.

Happy Ringing !!