The second story is even more thrilling. Cingular succeeded in convincing musical bands to release their songs first as ring tones before singles. Coldplay is the first band to practice this experiment. Their new song “Speed of Sound” will be available as a new ring tone six days before it’s release on radio and also a couple of months before their new album comes out in June. These ring tones maybe named as Cingular ring tones. Wow! Exciting hmmm, where this mobile technology is going? This industry has shown tremendous acceleration.
Another similar hit story featuring the music-goddess Madonna’s one of the latest songs. The mobile-phone ring tone was more important in thrusting Madonna's hit single "Hung Up" to the top of the charts than radio airplay. The song accomplished the No. 1 spot in 29 countries simultaneously in 2005 with 40% less radio airplay in the U.S than the average No. 1 hit. Senior vice president Warner Music, Michael Nash said: "I think it's not inaccurate to say that the mobile campaign, and the ring tone in particular, was more effective in launching the single than radio airplay".
Actually before experimenting ring tone hypothesis to Madonna’s song, New York-based Warner Music observed the phenomenon promoting a single by another major band signed to Warner, Green Day. He figured out that less airplay was required to acquire a greater chart success for Green Day. This fact compelled him to decide to "test the hypothesis" with Madonna's album’s promotional campaign, "Confessions on a Dancefloor".
The statistics of International Federation of the Phonographic Industry claim that mobile phones reported for nearly 40% of digital-music sales in the first major year that full songs were available over the mobile phone. The largest portion of mobile-phone music revenue was covered by ring tones, according to the research released by Informa PLC.
Saturday, October 31, 2009
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When mobile phones were introduced, this fundamental built-in feature (of course I am talking about ring tones here) was incorporated as a single innocent motive of informing the owner that someone is calling. But now with more advanced technology ring tones have converted into a more complex marketing as well as entertaining element.
Did you ever thought that ring tones could be so important? Welcome to the 21st century. Ring tones are hotter than Jennifer Lopez on a summer day.
There are zillion of places on Internet to download free ring tones plus the revenue generated by this business is shocking. This is just the start; ring tones market is continuously getting bigger.
Ring tones entered with a blast in to music industry. Maybe you are not aware about this fact that what impact ring tones imprinted on music industry? Well let me share with you few stories to show you the real picture.
I heard two interesting stories few days back. First one is that BBC stated, “ UK singles chart will include online downloads for the first time” this will bring a foremost impact on the top 10. In the first three months of 2005, 4.5 million songs were downloaded legally to the cell phones in the UK - compared with 5.8 million bought over the counter, and the fact that the down loaders tend to be mature males not teenagers made it a more serious marketing tool.
Did you ever thought that ring tones could be so important? Welcome to the 21st century. Ring tones are hotter than Jennifer Lopez on a summer day.
There are zillion of places on Internet to download free ring tones plus the revenue generated by this business is shocking. This is just the start; ring tones market is continuously getting bigger.
Ring tones entered with a blast in to music industry. Maybe you are not aware about this fact that what impact ring tones imprinted on music industry? Well let me share with you few stories to show you the real picture.
I heard two interesting stories few days back. First one is that BBC stated, “ UK singles chart will include online downloads for the first time” this will bring a foremost impact on the top 10. In the first three months of 2005, 4.5 million songs were downloaded legally to the cell phones in the UK - compared with 5.8 million bought over the counter, and the fact that the down loaders tend to be mature males not teenagers made it a more serious marketing tool.
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Seeing the growth of this booming ring tone market, many have joined this race to make money. Especially music companies such as MTV have joined hands with their cities telecommunication service to provide them with music and songs to be sold directly to the mobile customers. How the customer purchases the ring tone, from which website, which particular music or song is in demand, and offering competitive prices for the ring tone, are all taken into consideration by both the music companies and the telecommunication networks.
Mobile carriers too are able to offset their huge infrastructure investments with revenues form Mobile ringtones and other related content. It’s has turned into a significantly large revenue stream for telecom operators.
Brands are also reaching out to young consumers through mobile phones. Ad jingles are being converted into ringtones, as they generate brand recall. Specialist mobile marketing firms are helping brands to acquire and retain consumers via mobile music.
It can be said finally, that the Music Ring tone or Wireless Music is the most profit making business currently. Its booming market along side-by-side with some of the Music Companies shows that it is here to stay and introduce many more attractive features for the future and present interested buyers. Irrespective of the piracy act, it is here to stay, serve and boom in the market.
Mobile carriers too are able to offset their huge infrastructure investments with revenues form Mobile ringtones and other related content. It’s has turned into a significantly large revenue stream for telecom operators.
Brands are also reaching out to young consumers through mobile phones. Ad jingles are being converted into ringtones, as they generate brand recall. Specialist mobile marketing firms are helping brands to acquire and retain consumers via mobile music.
It can be said finally, that the Music Ring tone or Wireless Music is the most profit making business currently. Its booming market along side-by-side with some of the Music Companies shows that it is here to stay and introduce many more attractive features for the future and present interested buyers. Irrespective of the piracy act, it is here to stay, serve and boom in the market.
Mobile wallpaper free download
Mobile Music is also known as the Wireless Music. This includes mobile phone ring tones, color ring back tones, and mobile phone music (MP3). Caller ring back tones (CRBT) also known as Ring back tones. The caller ring back tone allows you to choose a song or music which your friends or family can hear when they call you.
Downloading ring tones from websites is a huge fad amongst teenagers who are crazy about ring tones.
It should be noted that downloading music isn’t all that easy. Some sites offer it free of charge, while on others, one has to pay a small amount.
Also one should have knowledge about mobile hand-sets. That is, know about the full functionality of the personal hand-set. Not all mobiles can accept MP3 formats from websites offering free ring tones. This all depends on the model of the hand-set, brand and features included in the mobile.
Due to this booming business of ring tones, many companies have come up selling pirated copies of songs or music which is illegal to have. A small Royalty amount is paid by a downloader and then the ring tone is passed on to others free of charge. Many industry bodies discovered that piracy was taking place from the mobile sellers end. They would store many latest songs into the hand-set without paying the royalty fees, before the cells were sold to the customers. Well known websites collect these ring tone royalties and give them to the music companies and the per
Downloading ring tones from websites is a huge fad amongst teenagers who are crazy about ring tones.
It should be noted that downloading music isn’t all that easy. Some sites offer it free of charge, while on others, one has to pay a small amount.
Also one should have knowledge about mobile hand-sets. That is, know about the full functionality of the personal hand-set. Not all mobiles can accept MP3 formats from websites offering free ring tones. This all depends on the model of the hand-set, brand and features included in the mobile.
Due to this booming business of ring tones, many companies have come up selling pirated copies of songs or music which is illegal to have. A small Royalty amount is paid by a downloader and then the ring tone is passed on to others free of charge. Many industry bodies discovered that piracy was taking place from the mobile sellers end. They would store many latest songs into the hand-set without paying the royalty fees, before the cells were sold to the customers. Well known websites collect these ring tone royalties and give them to the music companies and the per
Mobile movies
Mobile Phone Ring Tone Benefits
Now that you are able to understand the various types of ring tones that are available to you, the next question you may have is what you may be able to get by having these ring tones on your cell phone. These are just a few of the great benefits when it comes to having your very own cell phone ring tones:
• Benefit #1 - You will be able to know who is calling you without even having to look at your cell phone - One of the main benefits in having such a variety of ring tones for your cell phone is that you are actually able to set your phone so that there are special ring tones for specific callers. This means that you are able to give members of your family one tone, friends can have another tone, and people you do not have in your phone book can have a totally different ring. Doing this will actually allow you to know who is calling you without having to look at your wireless phone since you will be able to recognize the different ring tones for different people. If it is someone you do not recognize, you do not have to take the call.
• Benefit #2 - Your personality should be reflected in your ring tone - Another great benefit of obtaining personalize cell phone ring tones is that you have the leeway to let your ring tone reflect your personality. There is no limit that is placed on you that says you can only have one standard ring tone. No matter if you are feeling happy, excited, in love or happy there is a ring tone available to reflect your every mood.
• Benefit #3 - Every time your cell phone rings you will be able to hear your favorite song - Another great benefit of having a specialized cell phone ring tone is that you will be able to listen to your favorite songs whenever your phone rings. You no longer have to be bothered with listening to some annoying ring tone. Instead, you will actually be able to choose your favorite songs to have on your cell phone as ring tones so that you will be able to hear them each time your phone rings.
To Pay or Not to Pay
There is one important fact to take into consideration about ring tones. You must understand that there are free ring tones that you can download from the Internet or there are ones you can purchase. You may to make the decision as to what your budget can afford. The free cell phone ring tones sound better when you first hear them. It is worth noting, however, that many of the free ring tones do not have the best quality.
You will often find sites that offer free monophonic ring tones, but these are usually very outdated. There are some sites that may offer other kinds of free ring tones, but, if you want to get a popular ring tone that is of good quality, you must resign yourself to the fact that you are going to have to pay for them. You can expect to pay anywhere from $0.50 to $3.00 for each ring tone.
Ring Tones and Cell Phone Companies
There are now cell phone companies that are offering ring tones. Some of these cell phone companies include: Alltel, Cingular, T-Mobile and Verizon Wireless. Many of these companies sell the ring tones separately or they may offer various ring tone packages that offer you so many ring tones every month at a slightly discounted price. One of the great things about this deal is that you can usually end up getting those ring tones right on your cell phone instead of having to search the Internet endlessly for the ring tones that you want. In the long run, this will save a lot of trouble and hassle.
Now that you are able to understand the various types of ring tones that are available to you, the next question you may have is what you may be able to get by having these ring tones on your cell phone. These are just a few of the great benefits when it comes to having your very own cell phone ring tones:
• Benefit #1 - You will be able to know who is calling you without even having to look at your cell phone - One of the main benefits in having such a variety of ring tones for your cell phone is that you are actually able to set your phone so that there are special ring tones for specific callers. This means that you are able to give members of your family one tone, friends can have another tone, and people you do not have in your phone book can have a totally different ring. Doing this will actually allow you to know who is calling you without having to look at your wireless phone since you will be able to recognize the different ring tones for different people. If it is someone you do not recognize, you do not have to take the call.
• Benefit #2 - Your personality should be reflected in your ring tone - Another great benefit of obtaining personalize cell phone ring tones is that you have the leeway to let your ring tone reflect your personality. There is no limit that is placed on you that says you can only have one standard ring tone. No matter if you are feeling happy, excited, in love or happy there is a ring tone available to reflect your every mood.
• Benefit #3 - Every time your cell phone rings you will be able to hear your favorite song - Another great benefit of having a specialized cell phone ring tone is that you will be able to listen to your favorite songs whenever your phone rings. You no longer have to be bothered with listening to some annoying ring tone. Instead, you will actually be able to choose your favorite songs to have on your cell phone as ring tones so that you will be able to hear them each time your phone rings.
To Pay or Not to Pay
There is one important fact to take into consideration about ring tones. You must understand that there are free ring tones that you can download from the Internet or there are ones you can purchase. You may to make the decision as to what your budget can afford. The free cell phone ring tones sound better when you first hear them. It is worth noting, however, that many of the free ring tones do not have the best quality.
You will often find sites that offer free monophonic ring tones, but these are usually very outdated. There are some sites that may offer other kinds of free ring tones, but, if you want to get a popular ring tone that is of good quality, you must resign yourself to the fact that you are going to have to pay for them. You can expect to pay anywhere from $0.50 to $3.00 for each ring tone.
Ring Tones and Cell Phone Companies
There are now cell phone companies that are offering ring tones. Some of these cell phone companies include: Alltel, Cingular, T-Mobile and Verizon Wireless. Many of these companies sell the ring tones separately or they may offer various ring tone packages that offer you so many ring tones every month at a slightly discounted price. One of the great things about this deal is that you can usually end up getting those ring tones right on your cell phone instead of having to search the Internet endlessly for the ring tones that you want. In the long run, this will save a lot of trouble and hassle.
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Cell Phone Ring Tones; Personalize the music that you want to hear on your mobile phone
Now that you finally are the owner of a cell phone, a very popular thing to do is to try out new cell phone ring tones in order to give some added spice to your phone. If you happen to be a new kid on the block when it comes to cell phones and ring tones, a cell phone ring tone is a piece of MP3 music or a special sound that your cell phone plays to alert you when you have an incoming call. Instead of the same old dull ringing of your cell phone, you can have a custom sound for your cell phone's ring style. You can actually have different ring tones for different people who call your cell phone.
Available Ring Tones
When it comes down to cellular phone ring tones, you have to know exactly which type that you wish to choose from. You can opt to have a monophonic ring tone, a polyphonic ring tone, or some real/true ring tones as well. The following information will give you some insight into just what these various ring tones are. This may help you make a better decision as to which ring tone you wish to get.
Monophonic Ring Tones - While monophonic ring tones are almost obsolete today, when personalized ring tone first came on the scene, cell phone were only able to play ring tones that were monophonic meaning that they only had the very basic sounds. For these types of tomes, just one note is played at a time by one instrument. These monophonic tones were able to be produced through MIDI; these were used just as rudimentary ring tones. Someone soon figured out how these monophonic tones could be used to play very simple versions of popular songs. This started the boom of the musical ringtone business. Today other tones have become far superior to these, so very few people actually use the monophonic ring tone.
Polyphonic Ring Tones - When you take it to the next level, the next cell phone ring tone to consider is the polyphonic ring tone. There is a special sequencing technology ascribed to these ring tones. They are definitely a step above the monophonic ring tones. Forty different notes are able to be played at the same time with these ring tones. This means that you can literally have the sound of an entire orchestra. The sound coming out of the cell phone was much richer and the music tones even sounded much better! There is one drawback. Polyphonic ring tones are not able to use digital audio.
Real/True Ring Tones - Last but not least we have the most up-to-date type of ring tone, which is also known as a real tone or a true tone. These tones are actually able to play real music on your mobile phone. In fact, you will not only be able to get instruments, but you can choose to get the vocals as well. The real tone is not limited to electronic sounds. Real tones could be anything from voice, to music to sound effects. Most of the cell phones today will be able to play these types of ring tones; yet, many of the old style cell phones may not be able to play the real/true ring tones.
Now that you finally are the owner of a cell phone, a very popular thing to do is to try out new cell phone ring tones in order to give some added spice to your phone. If you happen to be a new kid on the block when it comes to cell phones and ring tones, a cell phone ring tone is a piece of MP3 music or a special sound that your cell phone plays to alert you when you have an incoming call. Instead of the same old dull ringing of your cell phone, you can have a custom sound for your cell phone's ring style. You can actually have different ring tones for different people who call your cell phone.
Available Ring Tones
When it comes down to cellular phone ring tones, you have to know exactly which type that you wish to choose from. You can opt to have a monophonic ring tone, a polyphonic ring tone, or some real/true ring tones as well. The following information will give you some insight into just what these various ring tones are. This may help you make a better decision as to which ring tone you wish to get.
Monophonic Ring Tones - While monophonic ring tones are almost obsolete today, when personalized ring tone first came on the scene, cell phone were only able to play ring tones that were monophonic meaning that they only had the very basic sounds. For these types of tomes, just one note is played at a time by one instrument. These monophonic tones were able to be produced through MIDI; these were used just as rudimentary ring tones. Someone soon figured out how these monophonic tones could be used to play very simple versions of popular songs. This started the boom of the musical ringtone business. Today other tones have become far superior to these, so very few people actually use the monophonic ring tone.
Polyphonic Ring Tones - When you take it to the next level, the next cell phone ring tone to consider is the polyphonic ring tone. There is a special sequencing technology ascribed to these ring tones. They are definitely a step above the monophonic ring tones. Forty different notes are able to be played at the same time with these ring tones. This means that you can literally have the sound of an entire orchestra. The sound coming out of the cell phone was much richer and the music tones even sounded much better! There is one drawback. Polyphonic ring tones are not able to use digital audio.
Real/True Ring Tones - Last but not least we have the most up-to-date type of ring tone, which is also known as a real tone or a true tone. These tones are actually able to play real music on your mobile phone. In fact, you will not only be able to get instruments, but you can choose to get the vocals as well. The real tone is not limited to electronic sounds. Real tones could be anything from voice, to music to sound effects. Most of the cell phones today will be able to play these types of ring tones; yet, many of the old style cell phones may not be able to play the real/true ring tones.
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A phone “rings” when its network indicates an incoming call and the phone thus alerts the user. For landline telephones, the call signal can be an electric current generated by the switch to which the telephone is connected. For mobile phones, the network sends the phone a message indicating an incoming call.
A telephone “ring” is the sound generated when there is an incoming telephone call. The term originated from the fact that early telephones had a ringing mechanism consisting of a bell and an electromagnetically-driven hammer, producing a ringing sound. The aforementioned electrical signal powered the electromagnet which would rapidly move and release the hammer, striking the bell. This "magneto" bell system is still in widespread use. The ringing signal sent to a customer's telephone is AC at 90 volts and 20 hertz in North America. In Europe it is around 60-90 volts AC at a frequency of 25 hertz
While the sound produced is still called a “ring”, more-recently manufactured telephones electronically produce a warbling, chirping, or other sound. Variation of the ring signal can be used to indicate characteristics of incoming calls (for example, rings with a shorter interval between them might be used to signal a call from a given number).
A ringing signal is an electric telephony signal that causes a telephone to alert the user to an incoming call. On a POTS telephone system, this is created by sending an alternating current signal of about 100 volts [90 volts and 20Hz in the USA] into the line. Today this signal may be transmitted digitally for much of the journey, provided as an alternating current only because a majority of landlines are not digital end-to-end. In old phones, this voltage was used to trigger a high-impedance electromagnet to ring a bell on the phone.
Fixed phones of the late 20th century and later detect this AC voltage and trigger a warbling tone electronically. Mobile phones are fully digital, hence are signalled to ring as part of the protocol they use to communicate with the cell base stations.
In fixed POTS phones, ringing is said to be "tripped" when the impedance of the line reduces to about 600 ohms when the telephone handset is lifted off the switch-hook. This signals that the telephone call has been answered, and the telephone exchange immediately removes the ringing signal from the line and connects the call. This is the source of the name of the problem called "ring-trip" or "pre-trip", which occurs when the ringing signal on the line encounters excessively low resistance between the conductors, which trips the ring before the subscriber's actual telephone has a chance to ring (for more than a very short time); this is common with wet weather and improperly installed lines.
Early research showed that people would wait until the phone stopped ringing before picking it up. Breaks were introduced into the signal to avoid this problem, resulting in the common ring-pause-ring cadence pattern used today. In early party line systems this pattern was a Morse code letter indicating who should pick up the phone, but today, with individual lines, the only surviving patterns are a single ring and double-ring, originally Morse code letters T and M respectively.
The ringing pattern is known as ring cadence. This only applies to POTS fixed phones, where the high voltage ring signal is switched on and off to create the ringing pattern. In North America, the standard ring cadence is "2-4", or two seconds of ringing followed by four seconds of silence. In Australia and the UK, the standard ring cadence is 400 ms on, 200 ms off, 400 ms on, 2000 ms off. These patterns may vary from region to region, and other patterns are used in different countries around the world.
A service akin to party line ringing is making a comeback in some small office and home office situations allowing facsimile machines and telephones to share the same line but have different telephone numbers; this CLASS feature is usually called distinctive ringing generically, though carriers assign it trademarked names such as "Smart Ring", "Duet", "Multiple Number" and "Ringmaster." This feature is also used for a second phone number assigned to the same physical line for roommates or teenagers, in which case it is sometimes marketed under the name "teen line".
Caller ID signals are sent during the silent interval between the first and second bursts of the ringing signals.
The interrupted ring signal was designed to attract attention and studies showed that an intermittent two tone ring was the easiest to hear. This had nothing to do with the coded ringing that was used on party lines.
[edit]History
AT&T offered seven different gong combinations for the "C" type ringer found in the model 500 and 2500 landline telephone sets. These gongs provided "distinctive tones" for hearing-impaired customers and to make it possible to tell which phone was ringing when several phones were placed closely together.[1] A "Bell Chime" was also offered, which could be set to chime like a doorbell or to ring like an ordinary phone.
Following a 1975 FCC ruling which permitted third-party devices to be connected to phone lines, manufacturers began to produce accessory telephone ringers which rang with electronic tones or melodies rather than mechanically. People also made their own ringers which used the chip from a musical greeting card to play a melody on the arrival of a call.[2] One such ringer, described in a 1989 book, even features a toy dog which barks and wags its tail when a call arrives.[3] Eventually, electronic telephone ringers became the norm. Some of these ringers produced a single tone, but others produced a sequence of two or three tones or a musical melody.[4]
The first commercial mobile phone with customizable ring tones was the Japanese NTT DoCoMo Digital Mova N103 Hyper by NEC, released in May 1996.[5] It had a few preset songs in MIDI format. In September 1996, IDO, the current au, sold Digital Minimo D319 by Denso.
It was the first mobile phone where a user could input an original melody, rather than the preset songs. These phones proved to be popular in Japan: a book[6] published in 1998 providing details about how to customize phones to play snippets of popular songs sold more than 3.5 million copies.
The first downloadable mobile ring tone service was created and delivered in Finland in autumn 1998 when Radiolinja (a Finnish mobile operator now known as Elisa) started their service called Harmonium, invented by Vesa-Matti Pananen.[7], the Harmonium contained both tools for individuals to create monophonic ring tones and a mechanism to deliver them over-the-air (OTA) via SMS to a mobile handset. On November 1998, Digitalphone Groupe (SoftBank Mobile) started a similar service in Japan.
Ringtone makers
A ring tone maker allows a user to take a song from their personal music collection, select whatever section they like and send the file to their mobile phone. Files can be sent to the mobile phone by direct connection (e.g., USB cable), Bluetooth, text messaging, or e-mail.
The earliest ringtone maker was Harmonium, developed by Vesa-Matti Paananen, a Finnish computer programmer, and released in 1997 for use with Nokia smart messaging.[8][9]
Some providers allow users to create their own music tones, either with a "melody composer" or a sample/loop arranger (such as the MusicDJ in many Sony Ericsson phones). These often use encoding formats only available to one particular phone model or brand. Other formats, such as MIDI or MP3, are often supported; they must be downloaded to the phone before they can be used as a normal ring tone.
In 2005 "SmashTheTones" (now "Mobile17"), became the first third-party solution to allow ring tone creation online without requiring downloadable software or a digital audio editor. Later, Apple’s iPhone allowed users to create a ringtone from any song purchased for the phone’s iTunes library[10] but with some difficulties, including a 40-second limit, and the fact the file has to be an AAC format and whose name ended with the extension .m4r.
There are a variety of websites that let users make ring tones from digital music or other sound files; they upload directly to their mobile phone with no limit on the number of songs uploaded. They feature music editors that lets the user pick the part of the song they wish to set as a ring tone. Such services automatically detect the phone settings to ensure the best file type and format.
[edit]Ringtone business
The fact that consumers are willing to pay up to $3 for ringtones have made "mobile music" a particularly profitable part of the music industry.[11] Estimates vary: the Manhattan-based marketing and consulting firm Consect estimated ringtones generated $4 billion in worldwide sales in 2004.[9] According to Fortune magazine, ring tones generated more than $2 billion in worldwide sales during 2005.[12] In 2009, the research firm SNL Kagan estimated that sales of ringtones in the United States peaked at $714 million in 2007.[13] SNL Kagan estimated U.S. sales in 2008 declined to $541 million, due in part to consumers having learned how to create their own ringtones.[11]
[edit]Billing controversies
The ringtone business has prompted at least two lawsuits about the industry's business practices. In April 2005, the law firm of Callahan, McCune and Willis filed a class action lawsuit against Jamster! on behalf of a San Diego father and his ten-year-old daughter.[14] The lawsuit alleges that Jamster! scammed cellular telephone customers through the use of fraudulent and deceptive advertisements. The plaintiffs argue that the ads in question offered one free ring tone to cell phone customers who responded to the ad via text message, but failed to inform users that they would be subscribed to a monthly service.[15] As of March 2007 the lawsuit is pending.
On July 20, 2005, the Utility Consumers' Action Network, a non-profit California consumer advocacy organization, filed a complaint with the California Public Utilities Commission (CPUC) against Cingular Wireless for the unauthorized billing of non-communications related charges, such as ring tones.[16] UCAN claimed that Cingular billed its customers for Jamster! and other similar ring tone services without providing customers with the notice, opt-in, and proof of authorization requirements necessary for such charges.[17] UCAN further charged Cingular with violating numerous CPUC requirements by consistently telling customers with questions about non-communications service charges on their wireless phone bill that Cingular has no responsibility and cannot assist customers with their inquiries.[17][18] Federal court rules Telephone Consumer Protection Act does not apply to commercial SMS text messages sent to cellular phones
In June, 2007, the ruling came in in Satterfield v. Simon & Schuster, No. C 06-2893 CW, 2007 U.S. Dist. LEXIS 46325 (N.D. Cal. June 26, 2007), a case involving the transmission of an SMS text message promoting a popular author's "mobile club" to a cellular phone used by a seven-year-old child. The defendants, the publishing company that contracted for the transmission of the promotional messages and the service provider that actually sent the messages, argued that the subscriber, the child's mother, had consented to the transmission of promotional messages when, in order to receive a free ringtone, she checked the box in an online form labeled "Yes! I would like to receive promotions from Nextones.com affiliates and brands…."
In Satterfield v. Simon & Schuster, Judge Claudia Wilken ruled contrary to Joffe that SMS text messages are not covered by the TCPA, first, because the manner in which the SMS messages were sent by the marketer does not fit the statutory definition of an "automatic telephone dialing system," and second, because the plaintiff had agreed to receive promotional messages under a broadly worded consent provision, executed in connection with the download of a free ringtone.
A telephone “ring” is the sound generated when there is an incoming telephone call. The term originated from the fact that early telephones had a ringing mechanism consisting of a bell and an electromagnetically-driven hammer, producing a ringing sound. The aforementioned electrical signal powered the electromagnet which would rapidly move and release the hammer, striking the bell. This "magneto" bell system is still in widespread use. The ringing signal sent to a customer's telephone is AC at 90 volts and 20 hertz in North America. In Europe it is around 60-90 volts AC at a frequency of 25 hertz
While the sound produced is still called a “ring”, more-recently manufactured telephones electronically produce a warbling, chirping, or other sound. Variation of the ring signal can be used to indicate characteristics of incoming calls (for example, rings with a shorter interval between them might be used to signal a call from a given number).
A ringing signal is an electric telephony signal that causes a telephone to alert the user to an incoming call. On a POTS telephone system, this is created by sending an alternating current signal of about 100 volts [90 volts and 20Hz in the USA] into the line. Today this signal may be transmitted digitally for much of the journey, provided as an alternating current only because a majority of landlines are not digital end-to-end. In old phones, this voltage was used to trigger a high-impedance electromagnet to ring a bell on the phone.
Fixed phones of the late 20th century and later detect this AC voltage and trigger a warbling tone electronically. Mobile phones are fully digital, hence are signalled to ring as part of the protocol they use to communicate with the cell base stations.
In fixed POTS phones, ringing is said to be "tripped" when the impedance of the line reduces to about 600 ohms when the telephone handset is lifted off the switch-hook. This signals that the telephone call has been answered, and the telephone exchange immediately removes the ringing signal from the line and connects the call. This is the source of the name of the problem called "ring-trip" or "pre-trip", which occurs when the ringing signal on the line encounters excessively low resistance between the conductors, which trips the ring before the subscriber's actual telephone has a chance to ring (for more than a very short time); this is common with wet weather and improperly installed lines.
Early research showed that people would wait until the phone stopped ringing before picking it up. Breaks were introduced into the signal to avoid this problem, resulting in the common ring-pause-ring cadence pattern used today. In early party line systems this pattern was a Morse code letter indicating who should pick up the phone, but today, with individual lines, the only surviving patterns are a single ring and double-ring, originally Morse code letters T and M respectively.
The ringing pattern is known as ring cadence. This only applies to POTS fixed phones, where the high voltage ring signal is switched on and off to create the ringing pattern. In North America, the standard ring cadence is "2-4", or two seconds of ringing followed by four seconds of silence. In Australia and the UK, the standard ring cadence is 400 ms on, 200 ms off, 400 ms on, 2000 ms off. These patterns may vary from region to region, and other patterns are used in different countries around the world.
A service akin to party line ringing is making a comeback in some small office and home office situations allowing facsimile machines and telephones to share the same line but have different telephone numbers; this CLASS feature is usually called distinctive ringing generically, though carriers assign it trademarked names such as "Smart Ring", "Duet", "Multiple Number" and "Ringmaster." This feature is also used for a second phone number assigned to the same physical line for roommates or teenagers, in which case it is sometimes marketed under the name "teen line".
Caller ID signals are sent during the silent interval between the first and second bursts of the ringing signals.
The interrupted ring signal was designed to attract attention and studies showed that an intermittent two tone ring was the easiest to hear. This had nothing to do with the coded ringing that was used on party lines.
[edit]History
AT&T offered seven different gong combinations for the "C" type ringer found in the model 500 and 2500 landline telephone sets. These gongs provided "distinctive tones" for hearing-impaired customers and to make it possible to tell which phone was ringing when several phones were placed closely together.[1] A "Bell Chime" was also offered, which could be set to chime like a doorbell or to ring like an ordinary phone.
Following a 1975 FCC ruling which permitted third-party devices to be connected to phone lines, manufacturers began to produce accessory telephone ringers which rang with electronic tones or melodies rather than mechanically. People also made their own ringers which used the chip from a musical greeting card to play a melody on the arrival of a call.[2] One such ringer, described in a 1989 book, even features a toy dog which barks and wags its tail when a call arrives.[3] Eventually, electronic telephone ringers became the norm. Some of these ringers produced a single tone, but others produced a sequence of two or three tones or a musical melody.[4]
The first commercial mobile phone with customizable ring tones was the Japanese NTT DoCoMo Digital Mova N103 Hyper by NEC, released in May 1996.[5] It had a few preset songs in MIDI format. In September 1996, IDO, the current au, sold Digital Minimo D319 by Denso.
It was the first mobile phone where a user could input an original melody, rather than the preset songs. These phones proved to be popular in Japan: a book[6] published in 1998 providing details about how to customize phones to play snippets of popular songs sold more than 3.5 million copies.
The first downloadable mobile ring tone service was created and delivered in Finland in autumn 1998 when Radiolinja (a Finnish mobile operator now known as Elisa) started their service called Harmonium, invented by Vesa-Matti Pananen.[7], the Harmonium contained both tools for individuals to create monophonic ring tones and a mechanism to deliver them over-the-air (OTA) via SMS to a mobile handset. On November 1998, Digitalphone Groupe (SoftBank Mobile) started a similar service in Japan.
Ringtone makers
A ring tone maker allows a user to take a song from their personal music collection, select whatever section they like and send the file to their mobile phone. Files can be sent to the mobile phone by direct connection (e.g., USB cable), Bluetooth, text messaging, or e-mail.
The earliest ringtone maker was Harmonium, developed by Vesa-Matti Paananen, a Finnish computer programmer, and released in 1997 for use with Nokia smart messaging.[8][9]
Some providers allow users to create their own music tones, either with a "melody composer" or a sample/loop arranger (such as the MusicDJ in many Sony Ericsson phones). These often use encoding formats only available to one particular phone model or brand. Other formats, such as MIDI or MP3, are often supported; they must be downloaded to the phone before they can be used as a normal ring tone.
In 2005 "SmashTheTones" (now "Mobile17"), became the first third-party solution to allow ring tone creation online without requiring downloadable software or a digital audio editor. Later, Apple’s iPhone allowed users to create a ringtone from any song purchased for the phone’s iTunes library[10] but with some difficulties, including a 40-second limit, and the fact the file has to be an AAC format and whose name ended with the extension .m4r.
There are a variety of websites that let users make ring tones from digital music or other sound files; they upload directly to their mobile phone with no limit on the number of songs uploaded. They feature music editors that lets the user pick the part of the song they wish to set as a ring tone. Such services automatically detect the phone settings to ensure the best file type and format.
[edit]Ringtone business
The fact that consumers are willing to pay up to $3 for ringtones have made "mobile music" a particularly profitable part of the music industry.[11] Estimates vary: the Manhattan-based marketing and consulting firm Consect estimated ringtones generated $4 billion in worldwide sales in 2004.[9] According to Fortune magazine, ring tones generated more than $2 billion in worldwide sales during 2005.[12] In 2009, the research firm SNL Kagan estimated that sales of ringtones in the United States peaked at $714 million in 2007.[13] SNL Kagan estimated U.S. sales in 2008 declined to $541 million, due in part to consumers having learned how to create their own ringtones.[11]
[edit]Billing controversies
The ringtone business has prompted at least two lawsuits about the industry's business practices. In April 2005, the law firm of Callahan, McCune and Willis filed a class action lawsuit against Jamster! on behalf of a San Diego father and his ten-year-old daughter.[14] The lawsuit alleges that Jamster! scammed cellular telephone customers through the use of fraudulent and deceptive advertisements. The plaintiffs argue that the ads in question offered one free ring tone to cell phone customers who responded to the ad via text message, but failed to inform users that they would be subscribed to a monthly service.[15] As of March 2007 the lawsuit is pending.
On July 20, 2005, the Utility Consumers' Action Network, a non-profit California consumer advocacy organization, filed a complaint with the California Public Utilities Commission (CPUC) against Cingular Wireless for the unauthorized billing of non-communications related charges, such as ring tones.[16] UCAN claimed that Cingular billed its customers for Jamster! and other similar ring tone services without providing customers with the notice, opt-in, and proof of authorization requirements necessary for such charges.[17] UCAN further charged Cingular with violating numerous CPUC requirements by consistently telling customers with questions about non-communications service charges on their wireless phone bill that Cingular has no responsibility and cannot assist customers with their inquiries.[17][18] Federal court rules Telephone Consumer Protection Act does not apply to commercial SMS text messages sent to cellular phones
In June, 2007, the ruling came in in Satterfield v. Simon & Schuster, No. C 06-2893 CW, 2007 U.S. Dist. LEXIS 46325 (N.D. Cal. June 26, 2007), a case involving the transmission of an SMS text message promoting a popular author's "mobile club" to a cellular phone used by a seven-year-old child. The defendants, the publishing company that contracted for the transmission of the promotional messages and the service provider that actually sent the messages, argued that the subscriber, the child's mother, had consented to the transmission of promotional messages when, in order to receive a free ringtone, she checked the box in an online form labeled "Yes! I would like to receive promotions from Nextones.com affiliates and brands…."
In Satterfield v. Simon & Schuster, Judge Claudia Wilken ruled contrary to Joffe that SMS text messages are not covered by the TCPA, first, because the manner in which the SMS messages were sent by the marketer does not fit the statutory definition of an "automatic telephone dialing system," and second, because the plaintiff had agreed to receive promotional messages under a broadly worded consent provision, executed in connection with the download of a free ringtone.
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