Opinionated comments on mobile phone industry news

Here's some general common sense advise for use of ringtones. It's focused on adults, as I'm in that demographic group. Feel free to add your own advise.

Select a unique ringtone

Don't use the default ringtone of the phone, as 99% of people with the same brand or model will use that ringtone. Select another one from the stock ringtones, buy or borrow your own (Abiro Mobile Fun has a nice selection), or even create your own. The last choice is sure to make you unique and get interesting questions from the accidental audience.

Still, be a bit careful with the selection. Don't choose Pantera or Killswitch Engage unless you "have" to. Again, a mellow evergreen is better.

If you want to create your own it's now easier then ever, as all new phones support at least AMR, and most also MP3 or similar. Hence you can cut out a short phrase from a song or record your own synthesiser or guitar riff. Here's an example of a guitar riff I recorded yesterday. As I played it myself I'm pretty sure no one else in the world has the same ringtone (unless you use it; be my guest though).

Another factor here is that people appreciate uniqueness. I've often received comments on my ringtone choices. Especially when they are of the more bizarre kind, like my own riffs, heavy metal solos, "nature" sounds etc. If at a boring party or similar a unique ringtone can make a difference for your social life (in either direction).

Use Increased Ring

This is a good way to limit the intrusion on others "ear space". Also, if you are in a business meeting and forget to turn on silent mode this is still less annoying than a full blast of ugly ringtone. If you are away from the phone (not likely nowadays) you will eventually hear it, unless the caller tires.

Turn off ringing on meetings

Sometimes the best ringtone is a completely silent one.

All phones support meeting or silent mode, and most phones switch to vibration if the ringing volume is set to 0.

If possible and not already done, create a shortcut for meeting/silent mode so you can quickly make the switch before and after the meeting.

Use good judgment when selecting ringback tone

If your operator supports it and this is your business phone, select a mellow, professional sounding ringback tone, e.g. a classical tune or at least a mellow song. Considering people might wait for you for a while, and it could be a customer, your boss, loved one or anyone else affecting your bottom line and/or social status, you don't want to scare them away, but rather give a glimpse of how nice and approachable you are as a person. Seriously.

Also, you are not likely to change this often, so don't select the latest pop tune, as it will grow stale pretty quick.

Advise to manufacturers

Even vibration can be a bit annoying at times, so I would propose that all phones supported light flashing as an option as well, for both ringing and other notifications, like messages, calendar events etc. Ringing could flash differently than messages etc.

I also hope that manufacturers add text-to-speech as a complement to other notifications, as a way to autonomously get messages, events, directions etc presented while you are driving, on the bus, while watching TV or whatever. It could even be used to speak the name or number of the one calling, so you know if you want to answer if you are busy with something else.