Warner Plans Ringtone Ripoff
Working in conjunction with wireless entertainment firm, Mobileway, Warner Music Group will offer ringtone downloads straight to your mobile device. While services like this have been popular outside of the US for a while, Warner is the first major record label with a plan to capitalize on the increasing US popularity of ringtones. While having your favorite song as your ringtone is great and all, if not annoying, it will also be costly…
Each electronic ringtone that is downloaded will cost the caller 1.99 dollars, while tones with full music and vocals will cost them 2.49 dollars.
Even if it’s not clear to you from the get go, at $2.49 (iTunes charges $0.99), one of the most basic forms of mathematics, subtraction, will allude to the fact that you’re being ripped-off.
Details here.
September 19th, 2005 at 11:26 pm
I randomly came across this on a google search, but alas, the reason there is the price difference is because…as bizarre as it may seem…it includes public performance royalties because when your phone rings in public, it’s technically a public performance of the song. Artists get paid each time a song is played in a public setting…live covers, music before concerts, radio, tv promos/commercials…and now ringtones.