Ringtones, those song snippets that announce incoming mobile phone calls, are making noise at the top of the pop charts and on the bottom line of multibillion-dollar businesses. Young cell-phone users see a chance to show off their musical taste and customise an important gadget.
Music labels and cell-phone providers see a chance to build a vibrant, piracy-proof market for songs, video clips and other mobile entertainment.
Ringtones have emerged as a promising source of revenue for music publishers and record labels still struggling to connect with a generation used to getting music for free through Internet "peer to peer" services. Ringtone sales topped four billion dollars worldwide in 2004 and 300 million dollars in the United States, according to the market research firm Consect.
While download services like's iTunes seem to have settled on a standard price of 99 cents per song, ringtone sellers can charge two to three times as much for a 15-second snippet.
"This is not a fad that will go away in the next year or so," said Thomas Hesse, president of global digital business at Sony BMG Music Entertainment.
Billboard magazine, the music industry's top trade publication, launched a sales chart for ringtones last October.
"We knew it was an area of revenue that had record companies excited, but I don't think we were really prepared for the dimension of success we were seeing," said Billboard senior analyst and charts editor Geoff Mayfield. Now the number one ringtone typically outsells the number one download, Mayfield said. Hits like "My Goodies" by R&B singer Ciara have sold over one million ringtones.
Ringtones are even invading the pop music charts. In Britain, a song inspired by a ringtone of a cartoon frog kept mega-sellers Oasis and Coldplay from the top singles chart spot last month.
"Crazy Frog Axel F", a remake of the 1980s synth-pop hit by Harold Faltermeyer, has boosted sales of Jamster's "Crazy Frog" ringtone as well, said an official at the company that owns the rights to both. "We've seen very compelling ways to promote the ringtone and promote the single. It's sort of a virtuous cycle," said Dan Mosher, the US head of Jamster, a ringtone seller owned by VeriSign.
Until recently, most phones could only handle synthesised arrangements of pop songs, known as "polyphonics" or single-note "monophonics" that sound like doorbell chimes.
But the technology took a big step forward last year with phones that could play actual song recordings by original artists, known as "master tones" in the industry's jargon. "Ringback tones," which play music while a call is being connected, are another new feature.
While polyphonics and monophonics only provide royalties for songwriters and song publishers, the new forms generate payments for record companies and recording artists as well. Some see even more ambitious commercial use of mobile phones in the future.
"Ultimately we believe the phone will be the player of choice for mobile music," said Sony's Hesse.
Sony BMG already makes as much money from ringtones as it does from computer-based digital downloads, and ringtone revenues at rival EMI Group only slightly trail those from song downloads.
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