“Search any fee-based digital music service for the best-loved musical artists of the 20th century and most of the expected names show up. Elvis Presley, Bob Dylan, Jimi Hendrix and Frank Sinatra are all accounted for, with their complete catalogs available per song, at 99 cents apiece,” Jefferson Graham reports for USA Today. “There are holdouts, but none bigger than the best-selling recording group of all time: the Beatles. That could change before year’s end if there’s a settlement in a long-standing trademark lawsuit between the Beatles’ Apple Corps and Apple Computer.”
Graham reports, “Recent reports in the British press hint that lawyers for both sides are working toward a resolution that might result in not only a multimillion-dollar settlement but in making the Beatles catalog available online, initially at Apple’s iTunes Music Store. Both Apple Computer and Apple Corps declined to comment. In settling and securing rights to the Beatles catalog for iTunes, Apple Computer would gain a big advantage, he says. The Beatles, arguably the most-loved band of the rock era, have sold 166.5 million albums in the United States alone.”
“Since it opened iTunes, Apple has dominated digital music. With sales of 125 million digital downloads, it has an estimated 70% market share… Any deal among Apple Computer, Apple Corps and EMI Music – which owns the Beatles’ master recordings – would likely begin exclusively, then be made available on all the digital music services,” Graham reports. “To have the Beatles songs – and solo material from Lennon, McCartney, Harrison and Starr – available at a click of a mouse would ‘be the final barrier to legitimizing digital music,’ says Bernoff. ‘Digital music isn’t complete without the Beatles. That’s the only group you could say that about.'”
Full article here.
MacDailyNews Take: Old news is made new again by McPaper. See below.
Related MacDailyNews article:
Forbes: Apple vs. Apple; iTunes Music Store just might end up with exclusive Beatles deal – September 12, 2003
maybe now they’ll stop bitchin about the Apple (computer) name
This would be huge.
Stop horking on the Beatles.
It’s about money.
Jeez, grow up.
The Beatles suck cause of this. I thought they were mellow scousers, but it seems McCartney & Co. are blood suckers.
BTW, I’ve got most Beatles albums in my iTunes library in AAC (superior format) which is shared using Acquisition. So if anyone want them just search using a P2P and you can have em. My Mac is on 24/7.
Who cares about the Beatles. Bring on Madonna and Janet Jackson.
Okay, Smithy. You’ve had your little rant.
Now go back like a good little prol and play with your Garage Band tunes that no one will ever hear.
Oh, gee, Alec.
Maybe if your a good little boy Janet will let you suck on her limp tit.
Oh, gee, Alec.
Maybe if your a good little boy Janet will let you suck on her limp tit.
Oh, gee, Alec.
Maybe if you’re a good little boy Janet will let you suck on her limp tit.
McCartney was just seen in NYC at Gap Kids looking through the sale rack and being rude to fans.
and Michael Jackson was just seen at Toys R Us .. and he was having a “wardrobe malfunction”
How much of their own music does Apple Records still have the rights to?
Seriously…
Face it, it makes a change for a Brit to be abroad being rude to a Septic…
The nature of the music publishing biz, and a catalogue that big, THEY probably don’t know.
Best way to find out about a particular song is to approach one of the rights organizations regarding movie sync rights.
(Sorry about the multi-posts, BTW)
Why should Jobs & us shareholders pay up. No economic damage has been done, as it’s APPLE CORPSE choice not to put music on the i-Tunes Store. That’s their loss, not Apple’s. But as I’ve NEVER owned & NEVER will own one of their recordings, even if they did show up on i-Tunes, they won’t be getting my money, EVER. Not because of what’s going on with the law-suit. It’s because it’s crap, not even crap music, just crap. People who follow the Beatles remind me of the people who still run Microsoft. They know it suck’s, but they still insist on turning it on every day. So sad, they still live their lives like this. We should fight this to the end & even when the Brit judge sides with Apple Corpse, because the old fossil grew up with one radio station & that was all they played back then, we should keep appealing it.
If anyone wants Beatles songs, they’re all available on allofmp3.com. Real cheap, too.
fred ono lennon,
Shouldn’t you be on a Windows forum, troll boy?
Yo, Michael Jackson owns the catalog. And he’s a pawn of his lawyers, so the lawyers say, hey, we can bill some hours…this is all about billing hours.