Apple, the Beatles and the media
31/03/06 09:36 Media
issues
You might have noticed that Apple Computer and the
Beatles are back in court, arguing about who owns the
rights to the 'Apple' trademark when it comes to
music. Apple Computer says it can distribute digital
content, the surviving Beatles are saying naff off
Apple Corps set up in the sixties as a music company
so music and Apple is ours.
I don't want to comment on a court case that's ongoing, of course, but the media's reaction is interesting. Suddenly Apple Computer is portrayed as the villain - they've had a few judgements in France going against them, too, about rights management, so they're ripe for a kicking.
This is all too familiar in the IT industry and elsewhere. You might remember 15 years or so ago that even starting a word processor wasn't all that straightforward - you had to enter the right commands, you wouldn't have had one at home, you'd probably need some elementary training. Micosoft put a stop to that with Windows; just about anyone can operate a computer now, and within a few years Microsoft was predictably being criticised for achieving this. Skip a few years and we come to Google, the golden people of simple searching, and who have met with adverse publicity as they've grown simply because they're big.
And now it's Apple's turn. In this instance there are no issues surrounding anti-trust rulings as in the Microsoft case, nor any pervasiveness in computing as in Google - but they're suddenly very successful as a music distributor. So the press is having a go.
One day we've got to stop doing this to companies unless we believe they've actually done something wrong...
I don't want to comment on a court case that's ongoing, of course, but the media's reaction is interesting. Suddenly Apple Computer is portrayed as the villain - they've had a few judgements in France going against them, too, about rights management, so they're ripe for a kicking.
This is all too familiar in the IT industry and elsewhere. You might remember 15 years or so ago that even starting a word processor wasn't all that straightforward - you had to enter the right commands, you wouldn't have had one at home, you'd probably need some elementary training. Micosoft put a stop to that with Windows; just about anyone can operate a computer now, and within a few years Microsoft was predictably being criticised for achieving this. Skip a few years and we come to Google, the golden people of simple searching, and who have met with adverse publicity as they've grown simply because they're big.
And now it's Apple's turn. In this instance there are no issues surrounding anti-trust rulings as in the Microsoft case, nor any pervasiveness in computing as in Google - but they're suddenly very successful as a music distributor. So the press is having a go.
One day we've got to stop doing this to companies unless we believe they've actually done something wrong...
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