Skype announced on Monday it had reached a deal with music label Warner to provide ringtones for its VoIP service.
The sale of musical ringtones will be another source of income for Skype, which makes a large portion of its revenue from the fees it charges for premium services.
In two months, song clips will be made available as an option to users.Each 30-second music clip will cost $1.50, and will work similarly to the way current ringtones do. Warner is the first music label to sign a contract with Skype. Other deals with music labels can be expected in the future and could put Skype's selection of ringtones on equal footing with that of the major cellular carriers.
The entire catalog of Warner music currently made available to cell phone carriers would also be made available to Skype, with the VoIP provider initially featuring Madonna.
Warner also revealed other future music-related announcements to come from Skype, including a ringback tone service and other music-based personalization features.
Ringtones have become a huge business for the record industry, and some analysts say as much as two-thirds of the $1.1 billion generated from digital music could have come from that segment.