Anonymous

London

IT Sales

Surely, in the UK at least, the use of the term "ringback" is going to cause problems from the start? The term is already in use (at least by BT) for the notification service for previously-dialled and engaged numbers becoming free to call back. In this context, a “ringback tone”, without further explanation, would occur to most people as being the series of three, short rings which indicate that the engaged party has now cleared their line?

Unless I’m misreading this article (quite possible!), wouldn’t a better description of the service being touted here be simply “dialled ring tone”, since it is the ring tone heard by the dialler which is unique to the dialled person or service?