14 DAY TRIAL // A Condom ringtone for mobile phones has been recently launched in India, in an attempt to raise the awareness about HIV and prevent its spreading across the country.
Released by the BBC World Service Trust, the ringtone is part of a media campaign that encourages the use of condoms. The campaign is sponsored by the Bill & Melissa Gates Foundation, known for being involved in lots of philanthropic and social-awareness projects.
So, how does such a ringtone sound like? Well, like a choir that sings the word "condom" over and over again, and the final result is pretty funny. You can listen and/or download the ringtone yourself, for free, from its official website found at this address.
"Ringtones have become such personal statements that a specially created condom ringtone seemed just the right way of combining a practical message with a fun approach," said Radharani Mitra, Creative Director of the BBC World Service Trust India. "This downloadable ringtone provides an opportunity for our audience to translate a message into an action. The idea is to tackle the inhibitions and taboos that can be associated with condoms."
Although the BBC World Service Trust has created the ringotne for India, it can be downloaded and used by anyone in the world. The ringtone is encoded as an MP3, so in order to make it work, you need to have an MP3-compatible mobile phone.
The whole anti-HIV campaign is said to reach about 100 million Indian people. With more than 260 million mobile users in India, reaching them via their handsets is definitely a good idea. At the moment, it is estimated that about 2.5 million Indians have HIV (which generally leads to AIDS), so let's hope the new Condom ringtone reaches its goal and the number of infected people will not grow in the future.