Ringtone annoyance.

[levitynyc]

I know this is old news and i am probably the 10000th person to say this, but I feel like venting anyway.

Why am I forced to buy a song twice? I buy a CD, I rip it to iTunes and if I want to make a ringtone, I have to buy the song again from iTunes.

I guess I'll have to stop buying CD's and buy all my music from iTunes......oh wait....

 

[Sobe]

I know this is old news and i am probably the 10000th person to say this, but I feel like venting anyway.

Why am I forced to buy a song twice? I buy a CD, I rip it to iTunes and if I want to make a ringtone, I have to buy the song again from iTunes.

I guess I'll have to stop buying CD's and buy all my music from iTunes......oh wait....

It's $1.98 for a ringtone if you have to buy the song first.

If that's going to bust your budget, an iPhone probably wasn't the smartest purchase in the first place.

Skip that triple venti caramel macchiato at Starbucks for a day and you got 2 ring tones and change left over for a coke at the office vending machine.

Perspective people! Perspective!

 

[audiomixer]

Bummer having to buy a song I already have and then to pay again to make the ring tone. All I want is one ring tone to make my phone unique and I was happy that itunes even had the song (Mark Knopfler playing his guitar on his latest album) and the $1.98 is certainly not going to break my bank.
I just got my iphone on the 2nd of October and it came loaded with version 1.1.1. My wife's phone has version 1.0.2 loaded with 3rd party apps. The only one I wouldn't mind having is the IM app.

 

[cjmal]

It's better than having to pay 2.50 for a ringtone that i only keep for 90 days on sprint.

 

[Rodimus Prime]

but still crappier than the rest of AT&T's phone where making a custom ringtone is FREE. The ring tone on my AT&T [hone I edited from my mp3s to the 30 sec clip I wanted. Then uploaded it to my phone.

My phone is an AT&T phone (a lock phone) and has had ZERO modifications done to it.

Apple is 100% to blame for charging twice for the ringtones. It is apple being greedy because there is a tone of evidence supporting the fact AT&T does not care. Plus by the looks of it you can not even get ringtones from AT&T but only apple.

 

[gauchogolfer]

I think this is all because Apple is also in the music business, unlike AT&T. For the record companies, a ringtone is a separate license from personal music. If Apple didn't play along, I bet you'd see more labels pulling out of the iTMS.

 

[The General]

My girlfriend sings karaoke. I want a ringtone of her singing "Rock Lobster."

Does iTunes sell a copy of my girlfriend singing "Rock Lobster?" No.

Does Downtown Records sell a CD of it? Yes.

The system is broken.

 

[Kadman]

Perspective people! Perspective!

We have already paid for this music. We also have our own recordings of audio. We are being prevented from using it solely so that companies can make additional millions of $$'s off of us by making us buy our music twice (or blocking it's use altogether) if we want to use them as ring tones.

Perspective indeed!

 

[kainjow]

Meh... put it on vibrate/silent - save yourself $2 and you'll annoy less people at the same time

 

[Sobe]

We have already paid for this music. We also have our own recordings of audio. We are being prevented from using it solely so that companies can make additional millions of $$'s off of us by making us buy our music twice (or blocking it's use altogether) if we want to use them as ring tones.

Perspective indeed!

I suppose you go into restaurants and complain that you could buy a chicken breast for $0.59 instead of paying $18.50.

No you either pay the price because it you feel it is worth it or you take your business elsewhere.

Do you post up threads on Olivegardenrumors.com about how you love their endless pasta bowl but you'd really love to bring your own semolina wheat and eggs, cheese, and butter, and a propane stove and do it yourself in their dining room but only if they don't charge you for it and even then only if you can pick the exact seat you like.

And oh yeah when you screw it all up, they should bring you free food too.

 

[Kadman]

I suppose you go into restaurants and complain that you could buy a chicken breast for $0.59 instead of paying $18.50.

No you either pay the price because it you feel it is worth it or you take your business elsewhere.

Do you post up threads on Olivegardenrumors.com about how you love their endless pasta bowl but you'd really love to bring your own semolina wheat and eggs, cheese, and butter, and a propane stove and do it yourself in their dining room but only if they don't charge you for it and even then only if you can pick the exact seat you like.

And oh yeah when you screw it all up, they should bring you free food too.

Your analogy is WAY off base. It's not even close to the situation at hand. Care to try again?

A closer analogy with your food scenario would be if the Olive Garden charged you a second time for your meal if you wanted to take a small part of it (left overs) home with you. You've already paid for it once, now they want you to pay for it again if you want to eat the remainder at home.

 

[Avatar74]

I know this is old news and i am probably the 10000th person to say this, but I feel like venting anyway.

Why am I forced to buy a song twice? I buy a CD, I rip it to iTunes and if I want to make a ringtone, I have to buy the song again from iTunes.

I guess I'll have to stop buying CD's and buy all my music from iTunes......oh wait....

Nobody's forcing you to do anything. If you don't like the price, don't buy it. If you don't like the service, use another one.

Like someone else said, if 99 more cents is going to break your bank, buying an iPhone probably wasn't such a wise thing to do.

It's like people who think $250,000 is all there is to buying a Ferrari... I wonder if they start bitching when they realize that the average cost to maintain a Ferrari is $20,000 a year.

In the case of iPhone, AT&T is not the one providing the ringtones, or the software that allows you to create them. So I fail to see how what they offer and how they offer it can be remotely analogous to what Apple is doing. Apple, as a distributor of ringtones, is required to pay royalties to the music industry. They don't prevent you from making your own ringtones, but they don't have to help you figure out how to do so... and if they did, they might get sued by the record companies and lose both their ringtone licensing, as well as their iTunes Music Store licensing as a whole.

The difference being that Apple, unlike AT&T, has inked agreements with record labels that bind them, as a retailer, to royalty payments, and may also have other restrictions on how they are allowed to distribute content including the use of copy protection measures. Those copy protection measures if circumvented would violate Apple's agreement, and therefore Apple can't be the one to help you circumvent the copy protection measures without the permission of the record labels. AT&T has an entirely different type of agreement with record labels regarding ringtones.

If you want to blame someone for the arrangement, blame the record labels... and the best way to do that is to not patronize the majors. There's plenty of independent music on iTunes, and you should support it if you don't like what the major labels are doing.

 

[rdowns]

Meh... put it on vibrate/silent - save yourself $2 and you'll annoy less people at the same time

Amen, quoted so more people hopefully see it.

Can someone explain to me why people put annoying songs as their ringtones and then get embarrassed when you look at them when their phone rings? Tools.

 

[Avatar74]

Amen, quoted so more people hopefully see it.

Can someone explain to me why people put annoying songs as their ringtones and then get embarrassed when you look at them when their phone rings? Tools.

No, what drives me nuts is when they put annoying ringtones on, leave their desks (isn't the idea to keep the cell phone WITH you?), and the phone's sitting there with the volume at the loudest possible level so this annoying 20 second ringtone goes on and on and on distracting others from getting any serious work done.

And these are the same people who rationalize needing a PDA... for what? So their company can subsidize them playing games and text messaging their drinking buddies.

Me... I only have cool ringtones and I never leave my phone where I can't silence the ringer if need be.

 

[Gonzlobo]

I suppose you go into restaurants and complain that you could buy a chicken breast for $0.59 instead of paying $18.50.

No you either pay the price because it you feel it is worth it or you take your business elsewhere.

Do you post up threads on Olivegardenrumors.com about how you love their endless pasta bowl but you'd really love to bring your own semolina wheat and eggs, cheese, and butter, and a propane stove and do it yourself in their dining room but only if they don't charge you for it and even then only if you can pick the exact seat you like.

And oh yeah when you screw it all up, they should bring you free food too.

Jeez, what a stupid analogy. While it's honorable to be an apple fanboy, you take it to the extreme.

 

[calculus]

No, what drives me nuts is when they put annoying ringtones on, leave their desks (isn't the idea to keep the cell phone WITH you?), and the phone's sitting there with the volume at the loudest possible level so this annoying 20 second ringtone goes on and on and on distracting others from getting any serious work done.

My office is full of people like that. And of course just after each call it rings again to let them know they have a voicemail, and then again...

 

[megfilmworks]

I know this is old news and i am probably the 10000th person to say this, but I feel like venting anyway.

Why am I forced to buy a song twice? I buy a CD, I rip it to iTunes and if I want to make a ringtone, I have to buy the song again from iTunes.

I guess I'll have to stop buying CD's and buy all my music from iTunes......oh wait....

Still cheaper than verizon and you get the whole song and the ability to edit it.

 

[Sobe]

Your analogy is WAY off base. It's not even close to the situation at hand. Care to try again?

A closer analogy with your food scenario would be if the Olive Garden charged you a second time for your meal if you wanted to take a small part of it (left overs) home with you. You've already paid for it once, now they want you to pay for it again if you want to eat the remainder at home.

Nah, not really.

The analogy is fine. What's causing the cognitive dissonance is how you perceive digital media.

 

[Sobe]

Jeez, what a stupid analogy. While it's honorable to be an apple fanboy, you take it to the extreme.

That's it, attack with labels instead of making a serious argument or ignoring it altogether.

It's always better to name call than to enter the market place of ideas.

 

[Kadman]

Nah, not really.

The analogy is fine. What's causing the cognitive dissonance is how you perceive digital media.

It actually is WAY off base and shows that you really don't understand the situation. But hey, people are allowed to have opions and methods for processing various situations. You are entitiled to that. In the end, it's still a put-off that the restriction is there only for the purposes of them charging you a second time for something you already purchased. It has NOTHING to do with someone's ability to have xx amount of $$'s to spend as you originally suggested.

 

[megfilmworks]

It actually is WAY off base and shows that you really don't understand the situation. But hey, people are allowed to have opions and methods for processing various situations. You are entitiled to that. In the end, it's still a put-off that the restriction is there only for the purposes of them charging you a second time for something you already purchased. It has NOTHING to do with someone's ability to have xx amount of $$'s to spend as you originally suggested.

It pays to do research before you post. Your comments are totally wrong. Do your homework! What you want and what the copyright laws allow are two different things.

 

[Sobe]

It actually is WAY off base and shows that you really don't understand the situation. But hey, people are allowed to have opions and methods for processing various situations. You are entitiled to that. In the end, it's still a put-off that the restriction is there only for the purposes of them charging you a second time for something you already purchased. It has NOTHING to do with someone's ability to have xx amount of $$'s to spend as you originally suggested.

See there's the problem.

You think you already purchased it.

 

[The General]

If I rip a song from a CD and put it on my iPhone, I can play that song through the loudspeaker. I can sit my phone down and play all the music on my phone through the loud speaker. I can do all of this without paying a single penny. Someone could tell me "Hey, Ted. Play that one song on your phone," and I could be like "Okay," and play that song, on command, whenever I want.

How is this any different than having that song play through the loudspeaker during an incoming call? The same song plays through the loudspeaker, only this time it only plays 30 seconds of the song. And that's if I don't answer the phone!

Let's compare the two:

iPod Application:
1. Allows me to play full-length songs over the loudspeaker of the phone.
2. Allows me to play songs that I haven't purchased from the iTunes Music Store, over the loudspeaker for all to hear.
3. Allows me to do this without paying a penny.
4. Is 100% under my control. I tell it to play when I want it to play, and that's perfectly allowed.
5. I can play all the music on my phone, and it will let me create a playlist and aid me in doing so.
6. I have an EQ setting so that I can set it to "Bass reducer" which makes it so I can turn the volume all the way up without it distorting, and the sound carries further.

Ringtones:
1. Costs $.99 per song and $.99 to make it a ringtone. This means that it costs $.99 to get that song into your iPod application which will allow you to do all of the above without paying anything extra but in order to get it to play 30 seconds of that song during an incoming call you have to pay another $.99.
2. Only plays 30 seconds of song for all to hear.

Why does it cost extra? I refuse to pay for a feature that my phone already has. It has the ability to play MP3s over the loudspeaker. I'm not going to pay $.99 to get those songs to play when a call is coming in. Especially when I can just put MP3s in /var/root/Library/Ringtones and have it do that for free.

Apple needs to stop playing by the "law." It's not against the law to make my own ringtones, and even the RIAA is on my side in doing so. Companies like AT&T want you do think that it is the law so that they can charge ridiculous amounts of money for something that costs them absolutely $0.00.

http://apple.slashdot.org/apple/07/09/17/0355218.shtml

Apple needs to make it so iTunes will let you take ANY digital audio file and turn it into a ringtone. iTunes Music Store music, ripped CD, recording of me singing Mary Had A Little Lamb, various midi files, anything! When they do that, I'll upgrade to 1.1.1, but until they do that - I'm all hacked, all the time, always 1.0.2, and never buying anything from Apple that isn't a physical object with actual monetary value - none of this "intellectual property" nonsense.

 

[Kadman]

It pays to do research before you post. Your comments are totally wrong. Do your homework! What you want and what the copyright laws allow are two different things.

I do my homework and know exactly what I'm posting about. Please show me where copyright law expressly prohibits "ring tones" as a method of playing a song that you purchase as part of a CD.

See there's the problem.

You think you already purchased it.

I did. Both of you are simply falling for what the recording industry would like for the laws to be. As is becoming increasinly evident through numerous losses in court cases of late, they do not always interpret the laws correctly. You both need to open your eyes instead of just taking what's spoon fed to you by the industry.

 

[Kadman]

Very well put General!!