Internet Business Daily

After Apple officially announced the iPhone yesterday, there was a story on digg, which was a very compelling argument on why the new iPhone along with its competitor (smartphones) will cause the death of the largely profitable ringtone industry. Although there are many reasons to believe this point, I do not think it is true.

Businesses constantly change, that’s how companies stay ahead of the game. If a company fails to adapt to the market, it will be eaten up by another that did. The ringtone industry is not immune to this fact. They now have a hurdle to overcome to continue to be such a profitable market.

Here’s the problem: I currently have an Audiovox smartphone (I already know what your saying, but it was one of the first smartphones on the market). All I have to do to get a new ringtone on my phone is plug it into a PC and transfer a MP3 onto it and I have my new song. It is so easy and the ringtone quality is great. Now with the iPhone, just like every other Apple product, they are going to make the cellular phone something more wonderful than ever before. This means that MP3 ringtones, which are easily transferable to and from the phone, will be the standard of all cell phone companies. This is a great fact for the argument that ringtone companies are on the way out.

This is incorrect however. There are still ways that ringtone companies can make money. Let’s use personalized MP3 ringtones as an example. I came across a very cool site called mp3masher.com. This site allows you to basically be a DJ and create custom MP3’s “mashed” together from songs you already own. This site also goes a step further by allowing you to download the MP3 you created and therefore you are now able to transfer it to your new iPhone or possibly smartphone (for those of you who are crazy enough not to get an iPhone…just buy apple iphone).

It is obvious that these companies are going to have to make a change, no longer are people going to dial *34422 on their keypad to download a song for $1.99. Payed ringtones are definitely dead. Ringtone companies are going to have to go fully online and offer more than just copy written melodies. It may be difficult for them to adapt to the changing market, but it is far from impossible. Here is a pic of the beautiful iPhone, ill buy apple iPhone as soon as I can.