My ringtone is the theme from Jaws - I have heard the shark attack standing in the balcony listening to the never-ending construction sounds of Dubai.
Most phone calls do not add value to my life - but I am paranoid about missing calls. Is there life after mobile phones? Do I need to reform and become a Luddite? It does not help that I am an active member of the fraternity of privacy invaders for profit - viz. mobile operators. --- In [EMAIL PROTECTED], Udhay Shankar N <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote: > > Fascinating. It happens to me, too - though my "phantom rings" are > usually triggered by hammer-on or tapped arpeggios in guitar solos. > > Udhay > > http://www.nytimes.com/2006/05/04/fashion/thursdaystyles/04phan.html > > I Hear Ringing and There's No One There. I Wonder Why. > > By BRENDA GOODMAN > Published: May 4, 2006 > > SIX minutes 39 seconds into the Richard Thompson song "Calvary Cross," > Mike Pelusi, a music reviewer in Philadelphia, will almost invariably > check his cellphone. > > Minka Wiltz, an actress in Atlanta, has tried to answer her phone to > the thrrrrup, thrrrrup, thrrrrup of a truck bouncing down a > pothole-pocked street. > > Others say they thought they heard phones ring while taking a shower, > using a blow-dryer or watching commercials. What they are hearing is a > barely discernable sound perhaps chimes, a faint trill or an > electronic bleat that they mistake for the ringtone of their > cellphone, which isn't ringing. This audio illusion called phantom > phone rings or, more whimsically, ringxiety or fauxcellarm has > emerged recently as an Internet discussion topic and has become a new > reason for people to either bemoan the techno-saturation of modern life > or question their sanity. > > Some sound experts believe that because cellphones have become a fifth > limb for many, people now live in a constant state of phone vigilance, > and hearing sounds that seem like a telephone's ring can send an > expectant brain into action. > > "My experience has been hearing just a few notes that are similar to my > phone's ring, my brain will fill in the rest," said David Laramie, a > doctoral student at the Los Angeles campus of the California School of > Professional Psychology, who is writing his dissertation about the > effect of cellphones on behavior. > > He plans to send questionnaires this summer to learn when and how often > phantom rings happen and who is most likely to experience them. A few > notes in the background of a television commercial can fool him, he > said. Other times the culprit will be the sound effects in a song on > the radio. "Another place I hear it is running water, so I sometimes > hear it while I'm shaving," Mr. Laramie said. > > Phantom rings are a "psycho-acoustic phenomenon" related to the way the > human brain interprets sound, said Rob Nokes, president of Sound Dogs, > a sound effects company in California. > > The ear gives unequal weights to certain frequencies, making it > particularly sensitive to sounds in the range of 1,000 to 6,000 hertz, > scientists say. Babies cry in this range, for example, and the familiar > "brrring, brrring" ringtone hits this sweet spot, too. (Simple > ringtones are more likely to produce phantom rings than popular music > used as a ringtone.) > > "Your brain is conditioned to respond to a phone ring just as it is to > a baby crying," Mr. Nokes said. > > Why people seem to be hearing phantom rings more often now is another > question. The answers range from the paranoid to the vast exposure to > cellphones in people's lives there were 207 million wireless > subscribers nationwide at the end of 2005, a nearly sevenfold increase > in just a decade, according to the Cellular Telecommunications and > Internet Association. > > On blogs, some cellphone users wonder if an ominous agenda is at work > when a phantom ring is triggered by a television or radio broadcast. A > writer posting as Koan on forumgarden.com said that at first, songs > played on the radio triggered a phantom ring. "Thing is, the > high-pitched sounds, although a lot fainter, are still present during > announcements now," Koan wrote. "What is this? Is it subliminal > advertising ... or something else?" > > Peter Arnell, the chief creative officer of the Arnell Group in New > York and a major force in the marketing business, said that theory > might not be far off the mark. While he said he has never been asked by > a client to include sounds in an advertisement that would mimic a > ringing cellphone, he thinks the increasing use of high-pitched, > electronic tones is very much by design. > > "People are using a sound trigger to control emotions," Mr. Arnell > said. "The most controlling device in our life right now is a > cellphone." > > He suggested that a sound trick that sent confused listeners hunting > for their cellphones might be especially effective for ads ending with > a call to action. (An example is a directive to "Call this toll- free > number now!") > > "Hollywood has always known how to use sound to control emotions, > right?" Mr. Arnell continued. "But this is newer to advertising. Sound > effects have become the big deal on Madison Avenue." > > Michael Sweet, the creative director of Audio Brain, a sonic branding > company in New York that has done work for NBC and Verizon, also said > that he had never been asked to use a sound for the purpose of > generating a phantom ring. But he also said he believes that the > ear-brain trick isn't a mistake. > > "I think it's definitely intentional," Mr. Sweet said. "Do ad agencies > know they're getting your attention? Sure. Do they know it's because > you're trying to answer your phone to the TV? Not necessarily." > > Allen Henderson, who runs the blog AwfulCommericals.com, was bothered > by a Toyota ad showing a man dragging a rusted heap of a car uphill as > if it were a ball and chain. The chain eventually snaps and the man is > free to drive a Toyota. Mr. Henderson lamented what he called the > spot's overblown premise, but that wasn't the only thing. > > "Most of all," Mr. Henderson wrote on his blog, "I hate this commercial > for making me check my phone every time it came on the air." Steve R. > Chavez, creative director for Saatchi & Saatchi, the Los Angeles agency > that created the spot, "Ball and Chain," seemed tickled when told of > Mr. Henderson's phantom ring experience. > > "You know, it only took us 20 years to develop that," Mr. Chavez said > impishly. "I'm soooo kidding. > > "I think, as an industry, we're often accused of manipulation. It's > simply not true." And after this reporter was taunted by phantom rings > from "Homage," a television spot for Marriott Hotels, the ad agency > that created it, McGarry Bowen in New York, said any confusion was > purely unintentional. "Everyone here is kind of baffled," said Rob > Kaplan, the director of music production at McGarry Bowen. "No one > meant to put anything that sounded like a cellphone ringtone in the > spot." > > In "Homage," which was conceived as a tribute to business travelers, a > series of twinkling chimes punctuate shots of hotel rooms, a traveler > falling back on a bed, and shoes kicked off on the floor. > > Mr. Kaplan said the spot was created before he was hired but that the > sound design wasn't meant to fool the ear. "I've worked on a lot of > spots that have used a lot of modern, atonal sounds," Mr. Kaplan said. > "It is kind of cutting edge and compliments visuals really well." > > Intentional or not, audio experts say fooling the ear into hearing a > ringing phone isn't hard. > > As long as it's a more traditional trill, a telephone ring is a simple > tone that can be reproduced relatively easy, said Adam Jenkins, a sound > effects mixer who has worked on movies like "Crash" and "Apollo 13." > > "It's a 1,000 hertz tone that can be generated by just about anything," > Mr. Jenkins said. And because most sounds are the result of two or more > tones put together human speech is multitonal, for example simple > tones really stand out. > > Tones that are generated around 1,000 hertz have another special > characteristic that helps them hoodwink those within range. It is tough > to tell where they are coming from. > > Because humans have ears on each side of their head, they are able to > localize most sounds. The direction of high-frequency sounds is > pinpointed based on their volume level in each ear, and low frequency > sounds based on their arrival time in each ear. > > But Guy Moore, an assistant professor of physics at McGill University > in Montreal, said human ears do not do a good job finding the source of > sounds around 1,000 hertz using either method, so that a noise in that > range seems just as likely to be coming from the television to the > right as a purse sitting to the left. > > "That's also why it's so hard to tell where an ambulance siren is > coming from in traffic," Mr. Moore said. > > So, primed as busy people are to respond to a ring, the phone usually > is the first response to the question, "Where is that coming from?" > > Jonathan Wolff, a retired sound designer in Lexington, Ky., who created > the theme songs for "Will & Grace" and "Seinfeld," said he has > unintentionally created sound mixes that generate phantom phone rings. > "But I take it out if I think its going to be annoying," he said. > > While phantom rings may generate reactions from curiosity to > irritation, at least explanations for the phenomenon exist. More > mysterious are phantom phone vibrations, a cellphone side effect that > many people said they also have experienced. It seems that having a > phone set to vibrate can cause a particularly physical kind of false > alarm. > > Charles Maniaci, a special education teacher from Atlanta, said he used > to feel phantom vibrations almost constantly. Then about a year ago he > developed a lump on his thigh underneath the pocket where he kept his > cellphone. "Nobody could tell me what it was," he said. > > For a while, he moved his phone to a belt clip. But the vibrations > eventually stopped, and he moved the phone back to his pocket. "I've > thought that maybe the nerves got so irritated from the phone vibrating > that this tissue grew around them," he said. "That's what the body > does, it grows tissue around things to protect them. But it's exactly > where I used to keep the phone." >
