Cool question

To be honest, I've pretty much always had my phone on vibrate. No matter the situation.

The only time i ever had a ringtone was for my high school basketball coach and teammates. The coach and team was impressed with my jumping ability (for a white guy lol), and my nickname on the team was "the frequent flyer". A teammate of mine downloaded a MIDI version of "I believe i can fly" by R Kelly, and i set it as the ringtone for coaches and teammates. This was quite a while ago though.

But the fact that many ringtones cost money that you buy from shady sounding companies (Jamster, thumbplay off the top of my head) these days, its not really worth it to me. Im not a huge fan of paying money for phone luxury items...i already shell out enough cash a month on the basic service and some aps here and there.

Well I know that i used to have my phone set to a song, but I always had trouble hearing it since it wasn't distinctive / loud enough.

So I changed my ringtone around to a different song, but I edited the mp3 so that it did a few things:

1. It loops fairly seemlessly
2. It starts on a loud note
3. There are no quiet / slow parts to it.

I have a feeling that people are switching back to the familar stock tones for similar reasons. 

So my philosophy is this: Customize if you can, but just make sure you can still hear it.

Full circle.

I think we've come full circle. Everyone had so much fun with the ringtones, and then everyone got sick of them, and soon it was just the cool kids who had the factory standard ones, and now nobody cares.

I was on the bus about a month ago when my phone rang, as these things do, and someone said they liked my ringtone. Factory standard Samsung T-Mobile cheap pre-paid thing, still has frickin' keys you actually have to push. But they were serious. They liked it.

Okay, they were on the bus too, so maybe insane. Still, nobody likes custom ringtones, anymore. They're an embarassment.

Surely I'm partially responsible for that, because whenever someone with a douchy ringtone gets a call, I make sure to stare and glare the shame into them, until they hate whoever called them just then. Many people do this. I think people should have rotten vegetables thrown at them, for having dumb songs play. I've seen people apologize for having bad ringtones. I've been in a meeting, where someone was threatened with being fired, not because their phone rang during a meeting, but because they were a tool for having such a bad song as their ringtone.

Remember that song "Informer" by that white rapper Snow? You do now.

They changed it immediately, but still haven't shaken the nickname they earned. Yeah, "Informer". We all hate it, but what can you do? You can't just NOT call him that.

Anyway, status symbol. You hear my phone, it's the T-Mobile tone. You know I'm cheap. You hear someone with the factory standard iPhone4 tone, you're supposed to "ooh" and "ahh" because you know they got one. If it's just some embarassing song that plays, how will they prove how much better they are than anyone else?

Fun thing to do: Borrow or temporarily steal phone from a friend. Pick an awful song from the 1990's. That's most of them, truth be told. Give friend new ringtone. When they arrive somewhere in public, call them. Bonus points for sexual innuendo.
 

Caveat emptor: It's Saturday night, and I'm at home typing on the internet. You probably shouldn't do this with ALL of your friends, lest you find yourself alone like me.

Ringtones used to be big, but for me everything was ruined with the Crazy Frog ringtone. That thing was all over the commercials and so annoying. I used to watch a lot of MTV back then and they put the crazy frog in every break. They also had other "funny" ringtones in these commercials and it all got worse. The only thing more annoying than hearing these stupid ringtones while sitting in the train at 7am were the kids who used their phones as a stereo and tortured everyone in the vicinity. Maybe you also know a person who had baby laughter as a ringtone. That makes me feel embarrassed.

It's kind of a awkward topic, because one might think it is a way to express yourself. Like you selected your fav. movie theme song, many other people don't know it and they'll be confused. If you like the theme of Starman (which is great by the way) and that starts playing in the bus or train don't expect anyone to come over and say "Cool, that's the theme of Starman".

Right now I've got a Nokia phone and I use the standard Nokia tune, which hasn't really changed much in the last ten years. Before I had a Sony Ericsson, I chose one of those phone imitation ringtones. I don't need anything else, it gets the job done. I just want to get notified when I get a call without getting annoyed by the ringtone.

Hello Commodore, nice question.

This I DO have some opinions on.

First of all, I do like the idea of custom ring tones, midi or otherwise. Personally, I found a way to load midis onto my phone (which is hardly state of the art at this point) and have been using different pieces of game music and applying them to my friends. I have a friend who is a major Mega Man fan, so her ring tone is Dr Wily's castle from MM2 for example. Even for my non gamer friends I try to find tunes that sound like how I feel about them. I really love it... but my last phone? Well... I didn't get a lot of ringtones for it. It did utilize MP3, but I found out I'd have to pay per song.

So that's where my beef is with both ringtones and downloadable apps. There is no Steam for smartphones. I can use Steam to download my entire library of games to any PC I have it attached to if I want, as long as they support the requirements. But cellphones? Nope, that game you just sunk $20 into? That iTunes card worth of music you got? Not gonna' work on your new phone! You have to pay for them again.

And think about this... things like Tetris used to be standard with cellphones, but even that's a paid item now. Personally, I don't like paying for things I used to get free, let alone paying for them multiple times. And with as fast as people  burn through cellphones these days, I can understand them not wanting to put out. Also, since more phones are capable of using music and in iPhone's case, I'm guessing iTunes accounts can be accessed through them, they just have their music for their own personal listening pleasure. my particular phone has a distinction between ringtones and music, even if they're the same phone... and I am not paying to convert them into ringtones.

So in short, I do like customization - I love it actually, but until they make a Steam-like application that will universally be able to download ringtones and/or games to cellphones, it's just not practical if you don't expect to have this phone in a year or two. (or a lot of expendable income... that's always a factor too).

It could also be the extra charges... even sites you can download "free" ringtones from may cost you. I know there's lots of providors that charge by the meg when you download stuff, so even if the ring tone is free and works,  text, net,and/or download charges may apply.

*As has been noted, some people have ... inappropriate ringtones. I do not endorse these. As a retail clerk I had to call a customer about an order and they had a customized 'song' to listen to as their waiting tone. It was a hardcore rap song containing sex, violence and swearing which I did not appreciate. I was only glad it wasn't a ringtone in the store.

I am always keep my phone on vibrate for a few reasons.  I do my best as to not disturb others around me, if that be at work, out and about, or home.  Keeping my phone on vibrate is a very unobtrusive way to be alerted to a phone call or text message.  Sometimes I'm not always able to hear my phone in my pocket anyway depending where I'm at, so vibrate makes more sense in those situations.  I also have a bad habit of not putting my phone on vibrate in situations where I need to (meetings, going to the movies, etc.) so leaving it on all the time helps my forgetfulness.

That being said I do have custom sounds for my ringtones.  Being a huge Nintendo fan I use the legend of zelda theme as my ringtone, and when I get a text it plays the "Link solved a puzzle/found a hidden something noise."  Not sure how else to discribe it but I'm sure most of you guys know the seires of notes I'm talking about :D.

Fairly rarely does it bother me what people use as their ringtones.  There are instances where some ringtones are inappropriate for some situations (you're in a business meeting with a bunch of people and someones phone starts playing music with a ton of foul language in it, yeah I've seen that a couple times) but generally speaking it doesn't really matter to me what people do.  I like the ability to customize what I have, so the more features in the regard, the better!

On a similar note, have you guys noticed more people setting up music to play when you call them, rather than the same dial tone we're all used to?  I see more and more of this.  This actually gets on my nevers, especially with people I call frequently (I have to listen to the same Muse song everytime I call my brother.  I love Muse, but it gets pretty old the millionth time I hear it....).  It's an ok feature I suppose, I just wish it maybe rotated music, rather than having to listen to the same song over and over.

Quick question: Would it be considered meta if your ringtone was "Call Me" by Blondie?

I think ringtones were just a big fad that is starting to die out. It won't go away completely, but people are less concerned about it now than they were a few years back. As far as I'm concerned, your ringtone is fine so long as it isn't a pop or rap song or something that is just obsurdly annoying.

As for my own phone, I prefer to keep it simple. It has to be loud enough for me to hear it and something that won't get on my nerves when I get a bunch of text messages. I got the theme for Contra on my previous phone (for free!!!) and was surprised when somebody a few years younger than me actually recognized it. My current phone has a little techno loop for unkown callers, a jazz loop for known callers, and a generic blues tune for text messages since that's the one I here the most. They're simple, kinda catchy, and I don't mind listening to them while I reach for my phone.

LoL, very appropriate chaindog. Though I prefer the song Call Me by Yoko Kano from Cowboy Bebop... but Blondies' is louder and more energetic for ringtone purposes ;)

Well, one thing to keep in mind is that retro is 'in,' so it makes sense to add  old-sounding rings as defaults on phones. Quite honestly, I find some of them to be much more of a relief than other obnoxious rings that I've heard over the years. I think this may be one explanation. Another explanation for the lack of variety in default phone rings is that a lot of companies probably feel that chances are, especially given the more advanced your phone is, if you're the kind of person that has say a smartphone, you already know how to change your ring to whatever you want yourself, and you probably already will, so there's little point in giving you a wealth of ring options. Also, I suspect it's just easier this way, too; give phones some simple defaults, and that's it. Don't focus on that feature too much, and don't worry about it, is probably the viewpoint of a lot of companies.

Touching up on what Drastic said, we may  have come full-circle with phone rings; having your phone loudly and obnoxiously play whatever shitty/popular song you want, whether it's new or not anymore, may be a novelty that has just worn off with most people. It was 'neat' for a while, but then people possibly started getting sick of it, and I wonder if that's because they got tired of hearing everyone else's obnoxious rings. Obviously, people still do this with their phones all the time, but I, too, have noticed that it does seem to be something that's worn off on a lot of people.

I used to just set my phone on vibrate all the time, too, also because I didn't want to annoy people with my phone's ringing. I don't really set it to just vibrate anymore though, but nowadays I either just turn the volume down a lot, or I turn the volume on my phone off.

Hooray, I was a winnar!

I kinda miss midis, so I could use game midis as ringtones. :P

For the longest time I had the first level from Top Gear on the SNES as my ringtone, heh.

Nowadays, I don't mind ringtones if they aren't too distracting. Sometimes you just have to have it on if you cannot feel or hear it vibrate. I would draw the line with really obnoxious people who are constantly texting in a quiet space; they know they are gonna get a response in 15 seconds or so from whomever they are talking to...so why not turn it to vibrate?

They expect frequent messages in a quiet enclosed space, but they leave their loud as hell message ringtones on. Argh!

I remember my first cell phone. A Nokia something. I thought it was bad ass I could play Snake on it. I found this one site that allowed ringers to be sent to my phone for free. I had midi versions of the Coca-Cola song and Bugler's Dream by Leo Arnaud (not John Williams).

When I finally got a phone that allowed me to create ringtones, I always tried to be as unobtrusive and minimally obnoxious as possible. For that reason, the CODEC sound from Metal Gear: Solid has been my ringtone for years. As well as the victory theme from Final Fantasy for my text messages.

Being a teacher, not a day goes by that I don't hear some obnoxious rap song that a student has recorded by putting his/her phone up against the stereo while their pop music radio station of choice plays it. It sounds awful, not just because of content, but because of the distortion. Totally obnoxious.

I Miss the old days of haveing custom ringtones. I remember when I first got my Motorola Razr back in the early 2000's. (Thats right the Razr is where it was at!) When I found out that I could record things and then put them as my ringtone I was amazed. I remember putting music on and placeing my phone next to the speaker. Sure the sound was crappy but I was happy because that made my phone diffrent from  others. 

Now a days, I'm not to much into having custom ringtones. I still have the stock ringtone Verizon has on all there phones. I do have R2D2 as my ringtone for when I have a text message. I always find it funny when I'm hanging out with friends and I get a text message. My friends just look at me and say "I think there is an R2D2 in your pocket."  

I remember the days where cellphones were limited to monophonic ringtones and every phone came with a standard of about ten ringtones. Customization was quite difficult and very expensive (at least here in Germany). I remember all these tedious commercials in the television...

When I got my first cellphone I always wanted an unique ringtone. There wasn't really much to "play" around on such old phones. It only had the basic functions like short-messages, phonebook, alarm and maybe one or two games.

Then there were polyphonic ringtones. That's the time where I started making my own MIDI-files. It got much easier making your own ringtones. 

But something changed when I got my first cellphone that could play MP3s as a ringtone. I don't know. The "magic" vanished. Maybe because mono-/polyphonic ringtones are much more memorable than whole songs (in MP3). A friend of mine still has an old Nokia and I kind of like it when his phone starts to ring. It's just something different and nice to hear.

When I got my first smartphone I completely lost interest and didn't really care what my ringtone sounds like. I'm using one of the standard Android ringtones that sounds like a regular phonebell. I like it minimalistic. While setting your favorite song as a ringtone butchers the quality to the max. It's just unpleasant to hear.

Well, most of the time my phone is set to vibrate only, because I'm sitting in the university or in the train. I really don't like if my phone starts ringing in a public place. Just as much as I don't like other peoples phones ringing in a full train, just as an example. It's quite disturbing, at least in my opinion.

Nowadays there are much more things to play with (especially on a smartphone) so I think people really don't care about that anymore. But I still have some friends using songs as ringtones or still hear some in the train or somewhere else. There are still many people using custom ringtones, but yes, it's decreasing.

BTW, my first Weekly Wringer I'm watching here. It's great!

Title: Likely a spambot - Ookay? 

Greetings from Germany

You're only a "Likely Spambot" for the first five posts. Then you're on the level.

I prefer to have some basic ringtone that are kind of soft and not loud, blaring, or obnoxious, something like a catchy guitar riff with drums or something. I'm not a fan of any rap or pop music, as I know I'm not the only person I know who dislikes that music, but I know I wouldn't make my ringtone to something that might annoy other people.

I remember one day during school a few years back where, during a test, one girl's cellphone went off and started to loudly play some Justin Bieber song, and the whole class started laughing. Even the teacher was joking about it, and said "You should probably change that terrible ringtone", which most of the people in the room agreed.

Anyway, my point is, some ringtones are just annoying/obnoxious to people. In my opinion, have a ringtone that sounds catchy and won't be irritating to others. My ringtone is "Man with the Machine Gun" from Final Fantasy VIII and my friends tell me that it does sounds pretty neat.

For me, a ringtone needs to mean something. and not just your basic ringtone, but the ringtones you assign to each person that regularly calls you. My best friends have a variety of personality-exclusive ringtones such as L's Theme from Death note, Wonder Boy by Tenacious D, and a version of the main Star Wars theme from...Star Wars. For a while on my old phone I set the ringtone for the girl I had been pining after for years and years as Linkin Park's Numb, which would always give me a dark smile.

Basically, if you have a phone and don't have a ringtone that says something about you, then you're doing it wrong. My very first personal ringtone was from the movie Akira, specially the track Tetsuo, which I refer to as the "Shit's Going Down" music. Any time a call came in, you better believe I heard it and reacted appropriately. I think the biggest question is, what ringtone do you choose to represent you best?

Halloween has been very uninterestign to me ever since I stoped dressing up for it 9in otherwords once I grew up and couldnt go trick or treating.). 

As for the Weekly Ringer, I make my own ringtones using Audacity by takign a song I own, and cutting a portion of it out, and Saving it as a Ringtone, then I send it to my phone.   

I love personalization of your stuff and rintones are no different. I like to have my own identity and, as a benifit, I'll know when I get a call.  What i mean by that is....Well, time for another story (I know havent heard one from me in a LOOONNNGGGG time). 

One of my friends has been in a situation where his phone rang (or someone elses) and Almost everyone in the room picked up there phone thinking it was there's.    Yeah thats it for the story.

I dont like hearign the same ring tone over and over and I would like to personalize mine so I know when its my phone.  Like I said, I make my own MP3's for free and so I get to use my library of Songs.  Remixes, Japanese, Video game Music (Final fantasy Victory theme anyone?) and many other songs most people are unlikly to have as a ring tone and still convey who I am.  Pretty much I enjoy my individuality and uniqeness. 

Halloween has been very uninterestign to me ever since I stoped dressing up for it 9in otherwords once I grew up and couldnt go trick or treating.). 

As for the Weekly Ringer, I make my own ringtones using Audacity by takign a song I own, and cutting a portion of it out, and Saving it as a Ringtone, then I send it to my phone.   

I love personalization of your stuff and rintones are no different. I like to have my own identity and, as a benifit, I'll know when I get a call.  What i mean by that is....Well, time for another story (I know havent heard one from me in a LOOONNNGGGG time). 

One of my friends has been in a situation where his phone rang (or someone elses) and Almost everyone in the room picked up there phone thinking it was there's.    Yeah thats it for the story.

I dont like hearign the same ring tone over and over and I would like to personalize mine so I know when its my phone.  Like I said, I make my own MP3's for free and so I get to use my library of Songs.  Remixes, Japanese, Video game Music (Final fantasy Victory theme anyone?) and many other songs most people are unlikly to have as a ring tone and still convey who I am.  Pretty much I enjoy my individuality and uniqeness. 

    I'm not sure if ring tones lost their novelty or if they are only popular with younger people.  Most people I know use the default ringer or always keep the phone on vibrate.  When I was in highschool 10 years ago, ring tones were huge  with the Beverly Hills Cop theme being popular.  Now, I think custom ring tones are viewed as immature and sort of embarrassing.

     The last time I heard goofy ring tones was while teaching at a university.  The other students seemed more annoyed than humored with the interuption to the lecture.  I thought it was sort of funny with the ring tone being some sort of rocket blast off count down.  She was mortified since the phone was going off for about 20 seconds before she could get it out of her bag.  There were usually two or three phones that went off during each lecture and most were just normal default sounds.  

    The only custom ringtone I ever used was the phone on the tv show 24.  I've never used a song as a ring tone because I found people that listen to their ring tone irritating.  Currently my text alert is a sound from Streets of Rage 2 where one of the enemies yells as he drops from the ceiling.  As far as leaving the phone on vibrate the new iOS 5 has a custom vibration programmer under the settings.  It's a neat little feature, but I'm not sure how many people will use it.  I think phones have enough distractions on them with all the media content for people to really be concerned with custom rings and vibrations.

I'm of the keep-your-phone-on-vibrate camp, one of the main reasons for this is that I am a high school student.

I have an Android phone, so i use ringdroid to make my ringtones, but i have found that most people do have the default. I wanted to throw this idea out there earlier, but I think the main reason for the decline is the growth of apps, and their simplicity. Apps have really become what people buy, so in turn most people dont buy ringtones, because they are not as readily available on smartphones. I couldn't buy a ringtone if i wanted to with t-mobile. using ringdroid i can make any song I have into a ringtone without paying a dime, but this is something that requires effort, and most people are honestly lazy or just don't know how.

So while everyone has said their personal reasons for choosing one over the other, generally ring tones are more difficult now then they were before, and people don't use them for that reason.

Ringtones get boring  quickly.   Also like any types of music not every tone is appropriate for any given situation so I think many people prefer a generic one.   One example is your phone ringing with your favorite hip hop or rap song in a meeting with someone important.  Not cool.  

I really have no problem with them as it only last a few seconds. The bigger problem is people with phones that blast music off their phone thinking that everyone else wants to listen to their crappy music that is completly distorted. It's annoying, rude, and just a probem with everyone around you.

I have to weigh in on your opinion of the “slutty costumes” women wear on Halloween. I think there is a huge difference between a woman wearing an uninspired and revealing costume, and a woman wearing a costume that is revealing, sexy, and original. I hate to be the “average” guy here, but I love seeing an attractive woman in a sexy outfit. There is something special about seeing my girlfriend dressed up on Halloween as a sexy version of the demon nurse from Silent Hill, or a revealing version of Jill Valentine. And it’s not just her, but the other sexy outfits girls wear at a Halloween party or at a club at Halloween as well. I will agree that seeing the woman wearing the “costume” of bra, panties, garter belt, and high heels on Halloween makes me shake my head and actually feel bad. I instantly think to myself that this woman has horrific self-esteem and uses this opportunity to get positive feedback for the wrong reasons. I do believe that “sexy” and “slutty” are two different things, though. There is a clear difference between a woman putting on something they picked up from Victoria’s Secret an hour before the party, and a woman wearing close to the same items, but put together in such a way that she resembles an iconic character from film, TV, or video games. I don’t mean to sound like a cave man, but I find it hard to believe that any heterosexual male has a problem with sexually charged Halloween costumes. Just because a costume shows more skin then fabric does not make it slutty. Also, how many times a year does a woman get the opportunity to dress in such a manner and not be socially judged? Sexuality is a huge part of the make-up of both men and women and there can be a celebration of this that can both be arousing as well as original. Because a woman decides to use Halloween as an event to celebrate her sexuality should not be looked at as a negative thing. I see nothing wrong with a woman doing such a thing and I am all for it. Again, though, there is a huge difference between slutty and sexy. Maybe you meant this during The Wringer, but I just wanted to throw my two cents in.

P.S. Long time watcher, first time commenter. I got the opportunity to meet both you and Roo at Pax East last year and it was the highlight of the convention for me! I really hope you guys both make it to the show this year and I can grab an interview! Keep up the awesome work!

Meh, for the slutty dresses thing I have to agree it makes me feel bad for the ones who arn't atleast being creative, but I don't mind a slutty costume. Well, I mean I'm a 14 year old boy, what the hell do you expect? I remember a cracked article I read about what not to wear for haloween, and slutty costumes was in it, mostly just because noone cares beyond masterbating later. There are websites and photo albums online dedicated to sexy haloween outfits. That would change a lot of people's mind if you told them this.

Cell Phone Ring Tones? Well first off, I do have a phone but it is a shitty phone for kids, and I only use it to call my Mom when I get home so she dosen't have to start worrying if I got home or if I miss the bus. That said when I do get a phone I plan to find some way to get my own ring tones, most likely just simple video games or small instrumental parts from songs I like. I might take a few ideas from this too (Probably getting something for each person and shit as well), though I'll probably be the kind of person to leave it on vibrate.

I have never thought about this change until now, and I do see it. My Mom and Sister used to have songs, now they just have the basic iPhone tones. I do see why this change is being made, but I'm not stating anything new here. Embarrasing in public with custom tones, annoying to others, takes away money to be spent on other apps, stuff like that. I personally love hearing music come on a phone, as long as it isn't too obnoxious, or distorted. I can enjoy a good rap or pop song, Baby isn't that bad of a song, it just isn't anything worth taking time out of my day to listen to. I just don't want to suddenly hear blasting my ears at full volume with no warning whatsoever some douchebag cussing or making some sexual inuendo.

This change does disapoint me, because just a few days before watching this, in the car ride to My dad's house for the monthly visit we have sattelite radio and we turn on a few comedy channels. One comedian was talking about ring tones. He was talking about how he was too dumb to get a custom tone and when he heard someone else with the standard thing "EEEEEY! You too!" and shit. It was funny. He was also sharing what he believes goes on in the meetings of the companies who make this stuff. "The testers didn't like bling bling blo blo ding. We're gonna try Blam blam *pause* bloo bloo binsch." This radio station plays some older stuff often, someskits from the 60s sometimes, and some making fun of Bush as if he is still president or the occasional black comedian's "We might have a black man in the white house.. *Some joke about them painting the whitehouse black or something here*". So it was sad for me to realize this brilliant way to discover who is shit with electronics or just lazy from their ring tones. Oh well.

Edit: OH! And also, what about that new Clan of the Gray Wolf thing up top? Who the hell changed it? Fix it!