Got a tip for us?
Let us know
Become a MacRumors Supporter for $50/year with no ads, ability to filter front page stories, and private forums.
Beatles Exclusively on iTunes?
- Thread starter MacRumors
- Start date
- Sort by reaction score
Some of you are predicting big Beatles sales if they go online. Others claim that the market is gone for those tunes. I'm happy to wait and see who's right, but I wish they'd finally get started so we can find out, rather than see "Beatles on iTunes" continue to be yet another Apple rumor that persists for years.
You guys do understand that such an agreement would be so iTunes could include tracks from the Beatles catalog in their store, NOT give them license to use their pick of songs in advertising, right?
With all due respect to the 'Fab Four', it would be pretty silly for Apple to spend a million bucks for the license to use one of their songs in order to promote the songs availability on iTunes.
Let's face it.. most of the folks who want Beatles tracks already have them.. so unless iTunes will be offering some never before released tracks (doubtful) the overall impact that this will have on Apples profits is marginal, at best.
With all due respect to the 'Fab Four', it would be pretty silly for Apple to spend a million bucks for the license to use one of their songs in order to promote the songs availability on iTunes.
Let's face it.. most of the folks who want Beatles tracks already have them.. so unless iTunes will be offering some never before released tracks (doubtful) the overall impact that this will have on Apples profits is marginal, at best.
I disagree. It's about mindshare. If Apple has the exclusive, then it's a selling point VS the Zune to new customers.
Even 100 million would be a steal. Remember that way back in 1995 Bill Gates and Microsoft paid the Stones 20 Million to use Start Me Up. The Who (Pete Townsend) has gotten rich all over again just from the CSI Franchise. Hey they wrote the songs so they should make the money IF they want to.
I feel so sorry that the Beatles will never get your moey and that their greed made you a thief.
I feel so sorry that the Beatles will never get your moey and that their greed made you a thief.
i have not pirated any music except for the beattles since itunes came out... if you dont give consumers what they want, they will find a way to get it... their own greed bit them in the ass and i dont feel the least bit sorry for them... now they have realized that they missed the boat, and they are crawling back to try to make money... sorry Yoko... you f$#%ed up!!!
I'm sorry; the list was real. It wasn't an official ban per se, more of a suggestion, sent by Clear Channel Communications to stations they owned.
Because it's so hard to find Beatles CDs in stores or on Amazon, our only choice is to pirate them...
Next.
There's a lot of speculation in that Wikipedia article and very few citations of credible sources.
And then there's this...
ive spent over 10,000 on itunes since it came out... you dont know me dude... im the farthest thing from a cheapskate in the universe.... im tyoing this now from my yacht in Bora Bora it isnt about the money, its about the convenience.... itunes works cause its instant gratification, im not going to fly to some developed country just to buy a cd by a group thats too stuck on themselves to join the rest of the world offering their product in a convenient manor... screw them...
they had the nerve to sue apple over and over, jobs named apple apple as a tribute... and they were supposed to be about peace and love... and you are defenfending them... they are greedy bastards and they reaped what they sow
Hope you're right.
But, for 10 million dollars they'd better have LIFETIME exclusivity. And offer a number of Beatles IPods.
The Early Days with the early beatles etched.
Revolver - Revolver etch.
Yellow Submarine color and etch.
Revolution
Get Back.
Abby Road...
But, Steve knows his business better then I.
So, Good Luck.
Like these previous guy's have stated,
for many, this music has already been Ripped
or LimeWired.
Steve may have to offer something new.
Optional hi-def download quality?
Suing doesn't automatically make you greedy or unpeaceful or unloving. They're protecting their property which I wouldn't fault anyone for doing (if that's all it really is.)
For the ad, I'm thinking:
"Hi, I'm a PC."
"And I'm a Mac." in a beatle wig
(crowd of screaming 12 year-old girls run in and mow down the Mac guy)
No not lifestime exclusive for 10 million. Microsoft got the Stones Start Me Up for Twenty Million 11 years ago just for the commercial run of that particular Ad campaign.
Yea. They wanted a big PRODUCT LAUNCH.. they were selling an operating system that cost, what.. $200+ a copy if you bought it retail? They weren't announcing the addition of Solitaire to an existing product that already had something like 70% market share.
Anybody who wants Beatles tunes probably already has them. Sure, the addition of Beatles tunes is a good thing for iTunes, and the sale of those tunes will add to Apples bottom line.. simply expanding their catalog peaks customers interest.. but not enough to justify spending a million plus bucks just to license a song for a 30 second spot.
If you were to poll 1,000 random people on the street, you'd be lucky if the majority of people would even know what the hell 'Apple Corps' was, let alone that they had a legal dispute over Apple Computers name.. so the 'joke' of selecting a song like 'Come Together' would be absolutely lost on most people.
Congratulations to Apple if they can add the Beatles to their iTunes catalog.. but save the advertising budget for the next gen iPod or OS 10.5.
Come Together would be understood by most people to mean the Beatles "coming together" with iTunes. No 'joke' necessary.
BTW - If you were to poll 1,000 Beatles fans, 999 would know that the Beatles' record label was Apple.
The Beatles don't need iTunes! They have Cirque Du Soleil . Anyway, how are those LOVE CDs doing? Better on iTunes with some special extra tracks I would guess.
Anyway, how are those LOVE CDs doing? Better on iTunes with some special extra tracks I would guess.
Anyway, how are those LOVE CDs doing?
Currently #5 on Amazon's Bestsellers list.
There's no doubt Apple would pull some kind of neat marketing campaign to announce this deal to the world (assuming it goes through). The people questioning the value of that don't understand how iconic The Beatles are.
Heck, even if not a single person downloads a Beatles track from the iTunes store, the fact that they're finally online, the media exposure that will produce (I've already seen several stories on it in the local news) and the fact that it could lead to things liked branded iPods make it worthwhile to promote in a marketing blitz.
I agree with those that say "Come Together" isn't the right choice. "Revolution" would have been great, but as far as I'm concerned, Nike *owns* that track after their incredible use of it in the 80s (and I'm not a Nike fan!).
I could see them being very coy and using a non-mainstream track such as "Tomorrow Never Knows" or something like that...
Heck, even if not a single person downloads a Beatles track from the iTunes store, the fact that they're finally online, the media exposure that will produce (I've already seen several stories on it in the local news) and the fact that it could lead to things liked branded iPods make it worthwhile to promote in a marketing blitz.
I agree with those that say "Come Together" isn't the right choice. "Revolution" would have been great, but as far as I'm concerned, Nike *owns* that track after their incredible use of it in the 80s (and I'm not a Nike fan!).
I could see them being very coy and using a non-mainstream track such as "Tomorrow Never Knows" or something like that...