Mint Condition Crazy Frog Ringtone Sells For £175,000

AN extremely rare first-edition copy of the “Crazy Frog” ringtone has been sold at auction for a record-breaking £175,000, according to a press release from renowned auctioneers Sotheby’s of London.

The ringtone, said to be in mint condition, was initially bought by a Liverpool teenager in 2004 who paid just £1 via text message after seeing an ad for Jamster on MTV, although after subscription services and a string of costly text messages sent by the download provider, it ended up costing him somewhere in the region of £135. Now 27, he discovered the ringtone on an old phone while clearing out his bedside locker early this year.

It is believed that the ringtone is among the first downloaded copies of the Crazy Frog ringtone, before the polyphonic sound file of a CGI cartoon frog imitating the noise of a low-powered motorcycle captured the imagination of a generation and exploded into a multi-million pound industry.

“The Crazy Frog is the one piece of art produced in the last 20 years that has truly become an icon of its time,” said Malcolm Harding, spokesperson for Sotheby’s auction house.

“After its release, it sold more copies than Sgt. Peppers. People couldn’t get enough of it, and it started a revolution in terms of what people would pay money for, ushering in the dawn of ringtones, wallpapers and funny GIFs. Nothing in the ten years since its release has come close to having such a huge impact on art, and we are proud to say that we have sold a mint-condition copy this morning to a private bidder”.

It seems the ringtone maintained its as-new condition by virtue of nobody ever ringing the lad who owned it, which only added to its eventual sale value.