Beatles music at last comes to iTunes

By Doug Gross, CNN

Beatles complete catalogue of studio albums, box set and singles are now available at iTunes.

(CNN) -- It's been a long and winding road, this relationship between Apple and the Beatles.

But Tuesday, at long last, the Fab Four made it to iTunes.

"We're really excited to bring the Beatles' music to iTunes," Beatle Paul McCartney said in an Apple news release. "It's fantastic to see the songs we originally released on vinyl receive as much love in the digital world as they did the first time around."

The iTunes store's main page featured a host of Beatles albums for sale, beneath an early photo of the supergroup.

The update came in advance of what Apple had promised would be a 10 a.m. ET announcement that would make Tuesday, "A day to remember."

Starting Tuesday, iTunes users can buy the Beatles 13 remastered studio albums from the Apple store.

Also available are the two-volume "Past Masters" compilation and the group's "Red" and "Blue" collections.

Fans can also purchase individual songs and a digital box set featuring live concert film -- an iTunes exclusive, according to the release.

The Beatles had famously been the most high-profile hold-out to making their music available via digital download (AC/DC is another).

Things you didn't know about the Beatles.

The surviving band members and the estates of the others had been reluctant to sign up, saying that the quality of digital music isn't good enough to do their catalogue justice.

That being the case, the past few years had seen rumor after rumor that the Beatles were finally going to arrive on iTunes.

"I am particularly glad to no longer be asked when the Beatles are coming to iTunes," said Ringo Starr. "At last, if you want it -- you can get it now -- The Beatles from Liverpool to now! Peace and Love, Ringo."

Yoko Ono, who had been vocal in her opposition to digital music's quality, said it's an appropriate time for the major music announcement.

"In the joyful spirit of 'Give Peace A Chance,' I think it is so appropriate that we are doing this on John's 70th birthday year," she said in the statement.

Single albums are available for purchase and download for $12.99 each, double albums for $19.99 each and individual songs for $1.29 each.

Apple Gets Their Multi-Touch Patent; Is Palm Screwed?

by Jennifer Van Grove 49 Comments

The US Patent Office has signed, sealed, and delivered a late Christmas present to Apple. On January 20th, the powers that be awarded patent #7,479,949, titled Touch screen device, method, and graphical user interface for determining commands by applying heuristics, to Apple. Essentially, Apple wins the war on their multi-touch technology and other copycats should be shaking in their boots.

The patent, which was originally filed on April 11, 2008, is a long detailed description of the technology, with the abstract reading:

“A computer-implemented method for use in conjunction with a computing device with a touch screen display comprises: detecting one or more finger contacts with the touch screen display, applying one or more heuristics to the one or more finger contacts to determine a command for the device, and processing the command. The one or more heuristics comprise: a heuristic for determining that the one or more finger contacts correspond to a one-dimensional vertical screen scrolling command, a heuristic for determining that the one or more finger contacts correspond to a two-dimensional screen translation command, and a heuristic for determining that the one or more finger contacts correspond to a command to transition from displaying a respective item in a set of items to displaying a next item in the set of items.”

And if MacRumors is right about Tim Cook’s intentions to aggressively take legal action against those ripping off Apple’s intellectual property, then the yet to be released to the public Palm Pre, which supports swiping and pinching, could find itself in a sea of turmoil.

Tim Cook has been quoted saying that, “Well, I don’t want to talk about any specific company. I’m just making a general statement that we think competition is good. It makes us all better. And we are ready to suit up and go against anyone. However, we will not stand for having our IP ripped off, and we’ll use whatever weapons that we have at our disposal. I don’t know that I could be more clear than that.”

We can’t wait to see how this all plays out. Let us know your thoughts and predictions in the comments.

[via World of Apple]

Apple Caves to Studios, Adds Copyright Protection to MacBooks

Appearing to cave to Hollywood demands, Apple has quietly added a restrictive copyright protection mechanism to its new MacBooks that is preventing customers from watching movies on external displays.

Apple has secretly included a copy protection scheme called High-bandwidth Digital Content Protection (HDCP) in the external display ports on the latest models of it MacBooks, released in the middle of October.

Apple has not disclosed the new anti-copying mechanism, and now increasing numbers of customers are discovering that they cannot play movies bought from the iTunes online store on many external monitors, TVs or projectors.

"I tried all the movies that I have purchased from the iTunes Store with the same result," said "Maxyourmacs," who complained about the issue on Apple's support forums. "None of them will play on anything but the MacBook's small 13-inch screen. This is crazy unacceptable."

Released by Intel in 2001, HDCP is designed to prevent digital pirates from outputting movies to copying devices, such as digital video recorders. In industry parlance, the technology plugs the "analog hole" -- the security hole created by analog devices like TVs and monitors.

By definition, the technology also prevents movies from playing on non-compliant devices like older computer monitors or flat-screen TVs, which many Apple customers are just now discovering. Even TVs a couple of years old may not be HDCP compliant.

The issue is complicated by obsessive secrecy surrounding the technology. HDCP has been added to many models of Blu-Ray players and other entertainment devices, and several laptops from a range of PC manufacturers. However, it is unclear how many devices are HDCP-compliant: Manufacturers don't explicitly label which products are and aren't. Even industry analysts don't know how widely the technology has been adopted.

Intel declined to comment, and Apple did not respond to several requests for comment.

However, the surging popularity of Apple's laptops and its iTunes online store is bringing the issue to the fore.

The copyright mechanism is posing problems for some customers, who are complaining in Apple's support forum that they had no idea their viewing devices were not compliant with the HDCP standard, forcing them to watch movies purchased from the iTunes Store on their small laptop screens.

"You really shouldn't be expected to know whether your video devices are compliant," said James McQuivey, a technology and media analyst at Forrester Research. "It's not your job. To require that burden on them is an unfair thing to do."

Apple's new MacBooks (including the MacBook Pro and MacBook Air) are the first Macs to include HDCP. McQuivey said Apple is clearly giving in to pressure from its studio partners.

McQuivey said studios are reluctant to deal with iTunes since its movie-purchasing model involves downloading content straight to a hard drive, where it is vulnerable to copying. Movies are easily copied and shared with friends on DVDs or thumbdrives (as long as the sharer also provides their password).

Movies from services like Vudu and Netflix, on the other hand, which stream movies over the internet, are much more difficult to copy and easier to police, he said.

McQuivey noted that iTunes' movie offerings (about 1,500 movies) pale in comparison to Vudu (5,000 movies) and Netflix (15,000 movies) because studios are distrustful of customers downloading movies to their hard drives.

Michael Cai, director of digital media at Parks Associates, a digital market research firm, said the headaches caused by HDCP is largely a result of poor communication between manufacturers.

"The industry hasn't done a very good job in coordinating with each other to make sure their devices are compatible with each other so you won't feel this issue," Cai said. "And they haven't done a very good job in terms of educating consumers with these issues."

Cai, himself, experienced the pains of HDCP. He recently tried to plug his Blu-ray equipped Sony VAIO laptop into his Sharp high-definition TV, and the image wouldn't show up.

McQuivey added that the HDCP restriction might be counterproductive for both Apple and movie studios: It could encourage MacBook owners to resort to illegal means of downloading, such as BitTorrent.

In the Apple support forums, this already seems to be the case.

"Apple will be out of luck, because we will, as of today, buy no more movies from the iTunes Store," writes a new MacBook Pro customer, who said he couldn't play an iTunes-purchased copy of Terminator 2 on his TV. "If this starts hitting the TV shows and the music videos, too, then we'll stop buying them from the iTunes Store as well."

Intel declined to comment. Apple did not respond to several requests for comment.