DJ Nitrogen News

CNET Video review of Sharetones for Android - 4.5...

Tue, 02 Feb 2010 12:24:08 -0800

CNET Video review of Sharetones for Android - 4.5 Stars!

Sharetones now integrates the Ringdroid ringtone editor and takes it a step higher with fade-in and fade out for each tone created.

CNET Gives the New Sharetones for Android a 4.5 Star Rating

Sun, 24 Jan 2010 11:24:37 -0800

CNET Gives the New Sharetones for Android a 4.5 Star Rating :

CNET likes the new Sharetones for Android, which now integrates the Ringdroid editor with Sharetones’ smooth fade-in/fade-out and patented ringtone recipe-sharing technology.

From CNET:

Reviewed by: Jessica Dolcourt on January 21, 2010

Here’s how to take the guesswork out of ringtones. Start with your own music collection on the phone. Sharetones compares your list to its growing database of user-cut ringtones and returns matches. After previewing and picking, Sharetones will extract metadata information about the sample ringtone and rip your own song to match it, including fade-ins and fade-outs. Bottom line: the only person’s music you touch is your own.

If that sounds complicated, don’t worry. The application’s interface is straightforward. You’ll see the ringtone matches appear—tap one to preview or save and rate the song. If there aren’t any matches in the Sharetones database, you’ll see a link to make your own. The integration of the Ringdroid ringtone editor means you can fashion your ringtones from the app and automatically submit it to the Sharetones database for other users. There’s also a new search bar in this version, so you can quickly locate specific songs.

Here’s what we’d like to see in the future: an in-preview navigation to scroll forward or backward through ringtone options, and a way to tag favorite ringtone matches from a deep results list. While we’re heartened to see the editing software included, Sharetones should also consider partnering with a traditional ringtone seller if they want to become a true one-stop shop. While not every user is willing to pay for ringtones made from their own songs, some will, especially those looking to acquire ringtones in bulk.

Sharetones is one of the 30 best Android apps according to Droid Free Apps and News

Wed, 13 Jan 2010 17:26:18 -0800

Sharetones is one of the 30 best Android apps according to Droid Free Apps and News:

Sharetones, by DJ Nitrogen, turns music on your Android phone into ringtones, alarms and notifications. Share ringtones legally with others who like the same music as you.

BMI Sues T-Mobile Over Ringback Tones

Mon, 11 Jan 2010 17:34:54 -0800

On December 19, 2009 performance rights group Broadcast Music Inc. (BMI) filed a copyright infringement lawsuit against T-Mobile’s US operation. The lawsuit was filed with the US Federal Court in Los Angeles, CA last month.

BMI claimed it had licensed ringback tones to the major wireless carriers, but that T-Mobile had not agreed to the deal. The performance rights group said the suit related to over 50 titles from its repertoire but didn’t confirm which publishers, songwriters or other individuals the suit represented.

This follows a move last year by the American Society of Composer, Authors and Publishers (ASCAP) - which files a similar lawsuit against AT&T. In it, ASCAP claimed that ringtones fell under the public performance Copyright Act. The claim was rebuffed by the court.

The new Motorola Backflip demo’d at CES. It sports an...

Mon, 11 Jan 2010 10:00:00 -0800

The new Motorola Backflip demo’d at CES. It sports an interesting design with a touch screen and touch pad behind the touch screen. Plus, a flip-over keyboard - hence the name. DJ Nitrogen loves it because, as an Android phone, it will absolutely rock with Sharetones, freeing up every song on the phone as a legally shared ringtone.

(Video from Digital Trends)

Concert review: Flaming Lips New Year’s Eve Freakout #3

Sun, 03 Jan 2010 10:00:00 -0800

Concert review: Flaming Lips New Year’s Eve Freakout #3:

Sounds like a great show, but what caught our attention was the “coordinated cell phone ringtones” during Pink Floyd’s Money.

MySpace Replaces Embedded Imeem Playlists With Ads

Sat, 02 Jan 2010 10:50:46 -0800

MySpace Replaces Embedded Imeem Playlists With Ads:

Technology acquisitions and integrations are never easy, as MySpace and imeem illustrate.

(story from Wired)

Motorola Droid off to a well covered start

Mon, 09 Nov 2009 18:07:13 -0800

Lot’s of press lately on the Droid. Is it a big hit for Verizon? An iPhone killer? A turnaround for Motorola? Here’s what some of our favorite sources are saying. One thing we know for sure - Sharetones for Android downloads have surged since the Droid launch, more than doubling comparable period downloads of Sharetones for iPhone. What’s really cool is that Sharetones lets Droid users get ringtones that were made by users of the Sharetones’ iPhone-owning customers.

Selected reviews and updates:

cNet - Initial Motorola Droid Sales Look Good

Engaget - Motorola Droid Review

Tech Crunch - Think the Droid launch was a letdown? Not so fast

SF Gate: Smartphone smackdown: Motorola Droid vs. iPhone 3GS

DJ Nitrogen receives patent for recipe-based ringtone sharing, establishing a new model for ringtone distribution.

Wed, 28 Oct 2009 09:17:00 -0700

San Francisco, CA – DJ Nitrogen, creator of the Sharetones™ family of ringtone apps, announced today that it has been granted Patent No. 7,610,044 by the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office. “This is our core process that lets users legally share ringtones between their mobile devices and enables providers to unlock users’ music with pre-edited ringtones,” said DJ Nitrogen CEO Chris Sindoni. “We believe this is the future of the ringtone business.”

The patent covers the method of sharing ringtone content independent of the audio content used to generate the ringtone. DJ Nitrogen refers to this as the recipe-sharing model. The “ringtone recipe” is the meta-data that extracts the ringtone from the full audio track, including start and end points, fade in/out and effects. DJ Nitrogen matches music on a user’s phone or media device with the ringtone recipes created by other users. These recipes are stored in the DJ Nitrogen cloud. Each recipe is made available to everyone in the DJ Nitrogen ecosystem who owns the source audio. This gives users instant access to a huge and growing selection of ringtones for music they love. The platform is fully compliant with copyright laws because users share only the recipe; they never share the source audio content. In the same manner that users share these recipes, providers can deliver professionally pre-edited recipes to their subscribers using the patented DJ Nitrogen process.

DJ Nitrogen leverages the explosive growth in smart-phones and the trend in full track music downloads to these mobile devices. The ringtone recipes are created and shared by users of the Sharetones ringtone editing applications, including Sharetones for the iPhone. The company’s new smart-phone apps, starting with Sharetones for Android, complete the ecosystem loop. They give music fans access to a huge catalog of ringtones, including over 95,000 recipes created by Sharetones users. The recipe matching happens in the background, so smart-phone users just preview and select their ringtones. The patent granted today also covers DJ Nitrogen’s process for checking if the source audio sought by the shared recipe is not available on the local device and automatically obtaining a licensed copy of that audio. This enables ringtones to be the point of music discovery, encouraging full track purchases from partner music retailers.

About DJ Nitrogen:
San Francisco based DJ Nitrogen is changing the way consumers and media providers engage with digital media by empowering an ecosystem that unleashes user creativity, protects copyright holders and delivers added revenue to media companies and carriers. The company has several patents (issued and pending) for the technology that powers its platform. CEO Sindoni and the development team are veterans of numerous large consumer Internet brands and start-ups. Visit www.djnitrogen.com for more information and to download a free Sharetones product.

Contact:

Bill Hensley - VP Marketing
DJ Nitrogen
bill.hensley @ djnitrogen.com
415-869-8859 x 716

Sharetones adds Ringtone Ratings for Android

Wed, 30 Sep 2009 10:07:00 -0700

The latest Sharetones for Android phones released to the Android Marketplace September 29th. Sharetones matches the songs on Android users’ phones with ringtone “recipes” for those same songs, made by users of the Sharetones desktop apps. This gives Android users instant access to ringtones.

Since these recipes are user-edited, the new ratings feature allows the Android users to rate them up or down, thus bubbling the best edits to the top.

The new Sharetones also features enhanced speed and adds a waveform graphic that shows the location of the ringtone within the song.

Sharetones is a new breed of ringtone solution, leveraging the trends in whole-song downloads and providing a social ecosystem for makers and consumers of music ringtones.

Sharetones is compatible with all Android phones, including the G1 and MyTouch. As the name implies, Sharetones are “ringtones you share.” It doesn’t matter what type of phone you have, and since what is really being shared is the metadata that defines each ringtone recipe, Sharetones is a truly legal method of sharing ringtones.

More information is available at www.djnitrogen.com.

Apple confirms iPhone ringtones are $1.29

Thu, 10 Sep 2009 11:03:14 -0700

In yesterday’s press event, Apple CEO Steve Jobs announced that the iTunes store will now sell pre-cut ringtones for $1.29. This is a big improvement on the old Apple model of paying for the song twice - the second time for the privilege of editing your own ringtone. Of course the 25,000+ users of Sharetones by DJ Nitrogen have found an easier and less expensive way to get custom ringtones from their music. With over 80,000 ringtone recipes in the Sharetones library, users have plenty of free choices without the need to edit their own.

Download a free copy at djnitrogen.com

Apple to Finally Offer Pre-Made iPhone Ringtones

Fri, 04 Sep 2009 09:26:55 -0700

Apple to Finally Offer Pre-Made iPhone Ringtones:

Yes, Apple has realized that:

1. There is still plenty of life left in the ringtone category.

2. The old Apple model (buy it twice) wasn’t working.

3. Services like Sharetones are a much better deal for anyone wanting iPhone ringtones.

Sharetones for Android 1.1 Takes Off

Thu, 30 Jul 2009 08:44:00 -0700

DJ Nitrogen recently released the latest upgrade to its Sharetones ringtone app for Android, and the new Sharetones 1.1 app has already outpaced the original Beta launch.

The latest Sharetones is significantly faster when checking a user’s song library against the DJ Nitrogen ringtone recipe database, particularly important for users with large music collections on their phones. Sharetones 1.1 also makes it easier to assign ringtones directly to contacts from within the app.

Android users can download Sharetones for freee at the Android Marketplace.

By the way, it looks great on the new myTouch!

More information is at djnitrogen.com.

cNet took a look at the new Sharetones for Android and liked...

Mon, 13 Jul 2009 09:30:12 -0700

http://cnettv.cnet.com/sharetones-android-1-0-beta/9742-1_53-50074131.html

cNet took a look at the new Sharetones for Android and liked what they saw. Check out their video review. Sharetones for Android lets Android users share unlimited ringtones directly from their handsets. Get it at the Android Market or visit djnitrogen.com for more information.

DJ Nitrogen powers unlimited ringtone sharing for Android users with Sharetones.

Tue, 07 Jul 2009 07:35:00 -0700

Information at djnitrogen.com/sharetones-android.html

San Francisco, CA – DJ Nitrogen, creator of the Sharetones ringtone sharing platform, announces the new Sharetones App for Android. Sharetones lets users to turn songs on their Android phones into ringtones, alarms and notifications. Sharetones is the only Android app that lets users get virtually unlimited ringtones direct from their handsets without needing to edit their own waveforms or pay the high prices from carriers or third party sites.

Sharetones matches the music on an Android phone with user-generated “ringtone recipes” stored in the Sharetones cloud - giving the Android user instant access to a huge and growing selection of ringtones. Sharetones handles the matching in the background, so all the user does is preview and select. During the introductory period, Sharetones gives Android users unlimited ringtones for free.

“We are really excited to be launching Sharetones for the Android platform,” says Chris Sindoni, DJ Nitrogen CEO. “So far the feedback has been great. It’s a simple concept really - Sharetones are ringtones you share. We match your music with someone else’s recipe to give you a ringtone, instantly.”

Sharetones for Android is built on the DJ Nitrogen content collaboration platform that lets users legally share their mash-ups and remixes with others who own the same source content. The ringtone “recipes” are created and shared by users of DJ Nitrogen’s Sharetones desktop applications or the new Sharetones add-on for the Songbird Media Player. Each of these applications features full audio editing capabilities, resulting in a huge database of custom ringtones. “Sharetones for Android helps complete the ecosystem loop” says Boris Ratchev, Product VP and leader of the Sharetones for Android development team. “It gives casual music fans access to over 65,000 recipes created by our desktop app users.” Serious DJs can still use the Sharetones Windows or Songbird app to send custom ringtone edits to their Android phones.

About DJ Nitrogen:

San Francisco based DJ Nitrogen is changing the way consumers and media providers engage with digital media by empowering an ecosystem that unleashes user creativity, protects copyright holders and delivers incremental revenue to media companies. The company has several patents (issued and pending) for the technology that powers its platform, including the “recipe sharing” technology that lets users legally share remixes and mash-ups of copyrighted content. CEO Sindoni and the development team are veterans of numerous large consumer Internet brands and start-ups. Visit www.djnitrogen.com for more information and to download a free Sharetones product.

Contact:

Bill Hensley
VP Marketing
DJ Nitrogen
bill.hensley@djnitrogen.com
San Francisco, CA
415.869.8859 x716

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Sharetones now makes ringtones for the Songbird Music Player

Sun, 21 Jun 2009 20:10:27 -0700

Sharetones now makes ringtones for the Songbird Music Player:

Now, Songbird users can make and share unlimited ringtones with Sharetones by DJ Nitrogen. Sharetones matches the music in a user’s Songbird music library with “ringtone recipes” made by other users of DJ Nitrogen products giving instant access to a vast and growing database of ringtones. Just a couple clicks sends the ringtone to a user’s mobile phone via sms.

If we don’t already have the ringtone you want, right click on any song in your music library to create your own with our audio editor. Once you create a ringtone its recipe is shared with all Songbird users so anyone with the same song can also enjoy your ringtone.

FREE during beta to all Songbird users. Enjoy!

This seems rather excessive

Sun, 21 Jun 2009 08:14:57 -0700

This seems rather excessive:

As you’ve likely read, a Federal jury found a 32-year-old Minnesota woman, Jammie Thomas-Rasset, guilty of illegally downloading music from the Internet and fined her $1.9 million, That’s $80,000 each for 24 songs.

User’s of DJ Nitrogen’s Sharetones don’t need to worry about the legality of sharing ringtones. That’s because with Sharetones users only share the metadata what we call the “recipe” - for songs they already own. The simple ideas can save you a lot of money.

DJ Nitrogen rocks Mobile Incubation Week Last week DJ Nitrogen...

Mon, 20 Apr 2009 11:07:00 -0700

DJ Nitrogen rocks Mobile Incubation Week

Last week DJ Nitrogen joined several other innovative mobile companies at Microsoft’s Window Mobile Incubation Week. While we didn’t take home the top prize, we received rave reviews on our legal solution to sharing content. Most of you who follow us will think we’re just about ringtones - Sharetones as we call them - but that’s just the start. DJ Nitrogen connects the ecosystem with benefits for users, providers and copyright holders alike.

This video captures CEO Chris Sindoni, VP Product Boris Ratchev and Developer Ilan Caspi during the event discussing the DJ Nitrogen platform, Windows Mobile and the Mobile Incubation Week.

Free ringtones from Sharetones

Sat, 11 Apr 2009 09:43:32 -0700

It’s been a very busy few months at DJ Nitrogen - sorry we’ve been rather quite on the blog - but we’re happy to present the newest addition to our lineup of custom ringtone products - Sharetones. What is a Sharetone? It’s a ringtone you share. Share-tone. Hmmm… that was simple enough. But isn’t sharing content illegal? Not with DJ Nitrogen’s patent-pending platform. Sharetones makes it simple (and legal) for users to create, consume and collaborate on custom ringtones from the music they own. We align ringtone “mash-ups” with user “match-ups” - that is: users can only see ringtones for songs already in their collections.The more songs you own, the more ringtone recipes you have access to. Over 50,000 different ringtone recipess (Sharetones) are sharing through the DJ Nitrogen Sharetones platform right now.

To celebrate Sharetones, we’re offering free ringtones. Whether you use an iPhone or any MP3-compatible phone, try Sharetones now and get free ringtones with no further obligation.

Try Sharetones now at: http://www.djnitrogen.com/sharetones.html

Share with a friend.

'Reactionary' Ringtones Spark Arrests In Tibet

Thu, 26 Feb 2009 13:47:09 -0800

'Reactionary' Ringtones Spark Arrests In Tibet:

Interesting story from NPR about the power of ringtones in Tibet.

All Things Considered, February 25, 2009 · Police in Tibet have swept markets in recent months looking for banned music. Chinese state media report that police have arrested several suspects for allegedly downloading to their cell phones music that the government considers “reactionary.”

Woeser, who goes by only one name like many Tibetans, is one of Tibet’s most outspoken authors. Recently, the Beijing-based writer has been blogging about the hidden world of reactionary ringtones, subversive songs and dissident downloads.

(The full story is at the link above.)