Will Activision Beat iTunes to the Beatles? And Who Cares?
Posted in Syndicated by at 9:59 am
This post was published 1 year 4 months 15 days ago and its content may not be valid anymore.
The rumor mill has a funny way of repeating itself and moving in circles until gossip eventually transitions toward fact. Back in March, the airwaves were abuzz with the prospect that the Beatles’ digital debut might come by way of Activision’s Guitar Hero video game and not, as widely expected, iTunes’ music store. That news didn’t pan out. Activision revealed their G.H. pipeline and the special release title in the current lineup turned out to be a Metallica special edition.Now, a few months later, the Financial Times is reporting on a similar Beatles story. A rumor repeat based on new disclosures. According to the new reports, a licensing deal worth several million dollars is in the works and could be weeks away. The parties are talking.
Honestly, I don’t know what this Beatles hubbub is about. I think everyone and their mother, if they listen to the Beatles, has a CD that they have ripped into iTunes removing the need to actually buy DRM infected digital downloads.
Honestly, and this is just opinion of course, I’ve never really cared for the Beatles.
Don’t Apple own The Beatles’ label now?
My guess is either iTunes first, or both at the same time.
I am a huge Beatles fan, and yeah, I don’t really care. In general, I’ve started buying used CD’s and just ripping those (to try to ween myself off of torrents).
The only time I ever use iTunes is for a soundtrack song or some single that I am too embarrassed to walk into a record store and purchase.
@Nigel…though Michael Jackson owned the rights to the Beatles music…and Paul was trying to buy the rights back from him or something like that….I shut up now…
@Nigel, you may be thinking of the legal battle that the record label Apple Corp (owned by members of the Beatles or families) had against Apple computers. The Beatles lost and had to pay court fees, but Apple computers doesn’t own the label.
Also, Michael Jackson bought most of the rights to the songs, but sometime in the 90’s, Sony worked out some 50/50 type deal for rights ownership.
I’m sure everyone was dying to have that cleared up.