Apple has turned on ringtones in their iTunes Store.
Songs available to be “ringtoned” are now accompanied by the ringtone symbol (bell icon):
iTunes customers are now able to create custom ringtones by selecting up to a 30-second segment from over a million participating songs on iTunes and easily sync them onto their iPhone. Once a customer has purchased a participating song from iTunes, including previously purchased participating songs, it will only cost 99 cents to make up to a 30-second segment of that song into a ringtone and easily sync it onto their iPhone. Customers can personalize their ringtones by choosing which portion of the song they want to use, and setting custom fade in and fade out points. iPhone users can assign a custom ringtone to be their default ringtone and they can also assign them to individual callers in their address book. Customers still have full use of the originally purchased song.
Visit Apple’s iTunes Store here.
[Thanks to MacDailyNews Reader “Joe” for the heads up.]
“Is there a technical reason I can’t do this? Or is it just a silly marketing limitation?”
Yes.
“instead of dittering around like some simple minded horse.”
I know people ‘dither’ around, but I’m not familiar with dittering; is that something only horses do?
I’m not seeing the bell anywhere… anyone else having this problem?
Eddie: If you’ll record “It works by you making your mind up before you assign the ringtone instead of dittering around like some simple minded horse.” and make it available as a ringtone, I’d spend $1.98 for it!
They should have an area where people can share the ringtones they’ve created….for all those who have no interest in creating their own, but want to use what already exists.
What if I make my own music and place it on my own Mac? How do I make a ringtone with my own music??
I am not willing to pay very much extra for a ring tone. I am tired of being commercially exploited – the source doesn’t matter. If I already have the fricking song on my iPhone (either from the iTunes Store or as a legitimate rip from a CD that I own), then why do I need to pay extra just because it is being triggered by an incoming call? If you set up an AppleScript that triggers iTunes to play Highway to Hell when the speaker detects a cuss word, should I pay extra for that song?
At this point, it is not clear to me which way the iPhone is going to go. It certainly has tremendous potential, but it is possible to drive a great product into eventual oblivion by unwise decisions. I’m willing to watch and wait for a while to see how Apple handles this new branch of their business.