Just as people enjoy listening to music online, the Internet is now a source for mobile enthusiasts to take their love for music into their mobile phones. While one used to have to pay to download a ringtone, several websites now provide free ringtone downloads from an online library of tunes.

Gone are the days where ringtones were monophonic or even polyphonic. Instead, song clips are now popular as ringtones. Several websites now allow you to easily create your favourite song into a mobile ringtone.

One such site is ikiMobile (www.ikimobile.com). This new website allows users to search and even create personalised mobile ringtones for free. With a few simple steps, users can produce their own professional ringtones.

This new service, which is like the “Youtube of ringtones”, provides a library of free user generated ringtones that includes the latest smash hits currently on the airwaves. Alternatively, users can choose from their favourite music genres or categories like ‘funny', ‘cool', ‘sport', ‘sound effects', ‘comedy', ‘Bollywood' and ‘sayings'.

To create a ringtone on ikiMobile is so simple and user-friendly that users as young as tweens who might not even know what a tempo or melody is can easily compose their own tones. If the tone the user is looking for is not already on the site or perhaps if they would like to share a tune that would be sure to strike a chord with the community, they can simply key in the URL from YouTube or any other similar video sharing websites. ikiMobile will work its magic and generate a ringtone without having to do anything else! From there, users can just download the tone into a computer or mobile phone directly through the WAP portal.

Furthermore, users do not have to pay anything for the ringtone. Instead each ringtone that they submit earns them points which allow them to download more free ringtones. They also earn point from interacting with other users like making comments and sharing information.

ikiMobile creates a community with its users by allowing them to interact with each other. They will be able to comment and rate the ringtones, collate their favourites or post a ringtone response, and also see what ringtones others are currently viewing.

With services like ikiMobile, users no longer have to put up with boring ring-ring tones or pay for ringtones. Instead, everyone can carry their favourite tunes with them and instantly know if their phone is ringing from their personalised and unique ringtones downloaded free from ikiMobile.

IkiMobile is supported by Creative Community Singapore. Creative Community Singapore (CCS) is a key initiative by the Ministry of Information, Communications and the Arts that aims to empower individuals, teams and organisations to initiate and pilot cutting edge projects that will unleash individual and community creativity, nurture creative ideas and build demand and capabilities for the Creative Industries.