Ringtone or Your Tone
By Radoslav Opalchenov

Recently, “Tokyo Drift”—the latest session of “The Fast and the Furious”—has not failed its fans with heart-stopping drift races around hairpins turns and switchbacks, as well as breathtaking displays of cars and mobiles, which now become must for people from all walks of life. It is impossible to deny today’s popular trend of cell phones and its accessories, one of which is the ringtone that is no longer confined to its attributed functionality but becomes symbol of chic and quirkiness.

Basically, ringtone is sound to signal an incoming call on the cell phone. The first generation of mobile phones used only few bells and beeps as ring and message tones. At this early time, the ringtone came into being and fulfilled its mission as sheer indicator. However, the fast-paced development of mobile phones has brought about the diversity and sophistication of ring tones. They have now been advanced and classified into three types which are monophonic, polyphonic, and true or real or master tones. Monophonic and polyphonic tones are usually saved in MIDI or native format which is only usable on particular phone brand or model. Besides, though much enriched with beautiful melodies and enjoyable sounds, they still seem too monotonous and inflexible to satisfy huge number of dynamic and stylish young consumers who always hunger for newness and particularity. As result, monophonic and polyphonic tones have given way to true tones, which promise great possibility of phone personalization.

A true tone (aka real tone or master tone) contains real voice, sound, piece of music, or even song. Generally, true tones are all about real sound, and especially cell phone characteristic customization. Thus, they have become significant source of income for ringtone companies whose websites offer variety of tones suiting all tastes, moods, and personalities of mobile users. Yet, several online businesses provide free downloads of ringtones, from which they will get many other tangible and intangible benefits.

Real tones are commonly saved in MP3, WAV, and sometimes AAC, which are compatible to most modern cell phones and can be easily produced by and import from computers. Normally, just copying famous singer’s current hit to your cell phone and setting it as ringtone is more than is enough to impress people around. However, uniqueness is today’s very thing that makes ringtone. Well catching this idea, users have started to compose outstanding self-created ringtones and personalize their mobiles. The job is not as difficult as people might think since the help of up-to-date audio software has eased the process allowing even computer novice to breeze through it comfortably and creatively. Try out music editing application or music morpher to cut the hottest part of song and then use it as your own ringtone or mix and modify voice, melodies, music with user-friendly audio effects and tools to create classy ringtones imprinted with your style. Also, for more fascinating result, use voice changing software to alter your voice or vocals of songs to any voice of charming gentleman, elegant lady, cute girl, naughty boy, or wise woman, etc. Actually, there are many tools out there for you to indulge your passion of personalization, and the possibilities are no doubt numerous.

In short, the advent of computer has brought new face to the mobile industry, particularly in ringtone production. People now have more choices and chances to customize their mobiles with stunning ringtones of all kinds. Despite the fact that they are criticized as cause to public nuisance and distraction, ringtones are extremely favored among cell phone users and become their indispensable accessories to stand out in the crowd.