We've reached a point in our modern day society where having a cellular phone is not a luxury, but a necessity. Children as young as toddlers have cellular phones and even the poorest people can be seen chatting away. Cell phones have evolved and developed immensely over the years to include the most advanced software possible. Different accessories became available as well as an assortment of colors to express individuality.

It was only a matter of time before people would want to personalize their cell phones even more. As there are so many people with cell phones, it started to get annoying when one phone would ring, because no one knew who the phone belonged to. Over time the cell phone companies started releasing phones with a wider assortment of ring tones. This started a craze and became quite a novelty. People would smother their grins when a phone went off with a quirky digital tune. Sometimes people would grumble in annoyance at a high-pitched ring tone sounding from the owner's pocket or handbag.

As with the changing and restless nature of society, people started to tire of these digital ring tones that came standard with all the phones. The cell phone developers saw a gap in the market, and once the technology was available to them they expanded the software. All of a sudden new phones were being released that had polyphonic ring tones included. These polyphonic ring tones sounded even more like real music. The market for services that sold ring tones grew quickly. Suddenly cell phone owners could pick up free pamphlets at stores advertising long lists of ring tones. These tones were still the standard digital tones, but polyphonic tones were also available for the phones that had the right functionality.

As the years have passed and technology has advanced even more, cell phones have become much more computerized. It was only a matter of time before REAL music could be used as a ring tone on a cell phone. It started with only the most advanced and expensive phones, but then progressed quickly. Today almost all fairly recent models of cell phones will play actual songs that can be used as ring tones. These ringing alerts are called true tones, and are much more expensive than the simple digital tones were. With this advancement in technology the services selling cell phone ring tones exploded.

Nowadays it is hard to turn on the TV or open a newspaper without being inundated with advertisements for services offering cell phone ring tones. Most are subscription services that will provide you with a selected number of new true tones each week and month with a set cost. These true tones can be transferred onto a cell phone in MP3 format, and there are even memory cards that one can buy for their phone to provide them with more space. This means they can have as many songs as they like!

Of course this means almost no one's ring tones are the same anymore. The range of true tones available is innumerable and you can have almost anything as an alert that your phone is ringing – animal sounds, songs, different voices and so much more.