By Beatrice Jeschek

After a long dispute, iTunes is now going to offer the Beatles music for download, according to The Daily Beast.

What took so long?

When in 1977 the Voyager spaceship took the acoustic heritage of humanity into space on a golden record, the Beatles had to stay on Earth. Their record company EMI did not want the song “Here Comes The Sun” to be listened to by extraterrestrial beings.

Thirty-three years later, EMI can no longer afford to alienate potential listeners. The company is heavily in debt and has to take what it can get. The time is favorable, especially as it is the 50th founding anniversary of the Beatles - John, Paul, George and Ringo are now everywhere. Also on iTunes.

For years, Apple's CEO Steve Jobs had courted the remaining Beatles. He wanted to offer the music of his favorite band to be available for downloading. His begging, however, fell on deaf ears because a brand dispute sour-faced the musicians and their heirs: Apple is also the name of Beatles’s own publisher (Apple Records).

The two companies had once agreed that Steve Jobs himself would keep his brand off the music business. As history shows, he did not keep his word. Only in 2007 the parties got along again.

Now, Steve Jobs has proven that his Apple is more powerful. For money he cannot fight that much because his music store is still a game of zeroes – at least so far – although iTunes has been a global leader for many years. So, financially speaking he may not care whether iTunes sells the songs of the Beatles. The agreement probably is more of a symbolic value. An important asset of cultural history is now available on his platform.

EMI, on the other hand, hopes for a good business anniversary to save themselves from the red. The newly remastered Beatles CDs (all the original albums plus two expensive box sets: The Beatles in Mono and The Beatles Stereo Box Set) that appeared last year were considered as a much-needed boost for EMI's balance sheet. All hopes now lie on the assumption that the younger audience is more interested in downloading the Beatles instead.

Also, it is not possible for EMI to eternally treasure the chambers of the Beatles anyways. The copyright protection of the first Beatles songs expires in just two years.

For the financial background story, read "Apple finally snares Beatles" (WSJ).

This article was first published 17/11/2010 on maltastar.com.