Speaker 1: Ridiculous History is a production of iHeartRadio. Welcome back to
Speaker 1: the show, fellow Ridiculous Historians. Thank you, as always so
Speaker 1: much for tuning in. Let's hear it for the Man,
Speaker 1: the myth legend, our super producer, mister Max William.
Speaker 2: Goo Goo June. I exist still he is the Walrus. Yeah,
Speaker 2: I am the man. I want to hold your hand, bro.
Speaker 2: There is none other than.
Speaker 1: There is none other than my my colleague, my compatriot,
Speaker 1: my brother from another mother, mister Noel Brown, knowl how
Speaker 1: you doing? I'm doing okay, man? How about yourself? Oh well,
Speaker 1: I'm still going by Ben Bullen.
Speaker 2: I know, yeah, yeah, yeah awkward. If I called you
Speaker 2: something else like Steve.
Speaker 1: Well Interpool hasn't caught me yet, you can.
Speaker 2: You can.
Speaker 1: In the meantime, check us out. I'm hanging out with
Speaker 1: our palace Jack Miles over on Daily's II.
Speaker 2: Guys.
Speaker 1: Hopefully they'll return to our show as well in the
Speaker 1: near future for some historical flexes. So if you're a
Speaker 1: fan of them, please bully them into coming on our show.
Speaker 1: M just with no no preface, no nice how you're doing,
Speaker 1: just to just try to coerce them into hanging out
Speaker 1: with us and speaking of coersion, Oh my gosh, we
Speaker 1: teased this earlier. We teased this for a few weeks
Speaker 1: while we were on the road as well. We have
Speaker 1: a series of episodes coming out about Apples, the History
Speaker 1: of Apple, john the History of Apples, the produce, the
Speaker 1: story of Johnny Appleseed. And know there's something that you
Speaker 1: and I were talking about out as well as with
Speaker 1: our buddy Jordan Runtalk that really stood out to you
Speaker 1: and I think it's a peak ridiculous history story that
Speaker 1: needs to be told.
Speaker 2: Well.
Speaker 3: It came from the recent series we did on intellectual property, copyright,
Speaker 3: trademark and all of that. And it turns out that
Speaker 3: one of the biggest trademark battles of our time was
Speaker 3: between two apples, the Computer Variety and the Music Variety,
Speaker 3: a record label founded in London in January of nineteen
Speaker 3: sixty eight by the Beatles John Paul that scamp Ringo
Speaker 3: and George.
Speaker 2: Don't forget about George, All things must pass as a banger.
Speaker 3: They wanted to replace their previous company, Beatles Limited, and
Speaker 3: get more of their finances under their own control of
Speaker 3: their catalog, but also kind of branch out into film,
Speaker 3: into retail into a development of other artists. You may
Speaker 3: well have some records that are on Apple Records that
Speaker 3: are not the Beatles.
Speaker 2: I think James Taylor.
Speaker 3: Released some stuff on Apple Records, John Lennon's Good Buddy,
Speaker 3: Harry Nilsen, and of course all things must pass. The
Speaker 3: record I mentioned before, the George Harrison double LP, is
Speaker 3: also released on.
Speaker 1: Apple and they called this is one of my favorite
Speaker 1: parts about the company, the Beatles. The Fab four called
Speaker 1: this company apple core, get it, get it, I love it.
Speaker 2: Hashtag very fire left behind now yeah good And.
Speaker 1: They were like, you said, you know, if we cast
Speaker 1: our memories back to early nineteen sixty seven, the Beatles
Speaker 1: are a worldwide phenomena. At this point, They've got Yeah,
Speaker 1: They've got all these hit records, They're getting songwriting royalties
Speaker 1: left and right in a way that the music industry
Speaker 1: hasn't really encountered on this level. But on the other side,
Speaker 1: they were still haunted by the bad deals they had
Speaker 1: made earlier in their collective career.
Speaker 3: Well, it's also one of those music industry history moments
Speaker 3: where it was very hard for bands to be able
Speaker 3: to exert this level of control, and only because of
Speaker 3: how incredibly successful the Beatles were were they able to
Speaker 3: do this like Another example might be Prince choosing not
Speaker 3: to renew his record contract with the label and recording
Speaker 3: and releasing and consequently owning all of his own master
Speaker 3: recordings from that point forward when he severed ties with
Speaker 3: that label.
Speaker 1: Yeah, and at this point we already see the money
Speaker 1: becoming a huge part of the conversation. Arguably, you could
Speaker 1: say the money becomes another member of the Beatles. They
Speaker 1: have multiple accountants, they have a staff of accountants, and
Speaker 1: in nineteen sixty seven they go to our pals, the Beatles,
Speaker 1: and they say, look, we're going to have to do
Speaker 1: a little bit of financial parkour just to get everything
Speaker 1: right with the tax man.
Speaker 2: So sheltering, I think is the term.
Speaker 1: Yes, give me shelter. They they are different bands, but
Speaker 1: different great reference. They tell they tell the they tell
Speaker 1: the bands that they need to shelter two million pounds sterling.
Speaker 2: Uh.
Speaker 1: And the best way to do this is to invest
Speaker 1: in a business.
Speaker 2: Can we Oh?
Speaker 3: I was hoping we were going to do some inflation calculation.
Speaker 3: All right, we must let's get that boop.
Speaker 2: We got some.
Speaker 3: Oh, it was a nice harmony of boops in today's pounds.
Speaker 3: I guess it would be euros, right, this would be
Speaker 3: fifty million pounds sterling in today's money.
Speaker 2: But we didn't do this the euro.
Speaker 1: Calculation, Yeah, because we support Brexit. Kidding, kidding, right, right.
Speaker 2: Let's deal with that going bill in EU. They never
Speaker 2: they England. England was the one country that didn't sweat.
Speaker 3: Right, you're so right, You're so right. My mistake. Still
Speaker 3: wondering how Breggs it's going, though, we heard tell.
Speaker 1: Check in there are some regrets, but none of those
Speaker 1: regrets are coming from Russia, which absolutely loved Brexit and
Speaker 1: anything that can break up the EU.
Speaker 3: Yeah, yeah, hoping for something similar Back here in the States.
Speaker 1: They sure are hoping. Oh my gosh, check out our
Speaker 1: show stuff that'll want you to know. Also, Okay, the
Speaker 1: big tent asset of this, this massive apple Core enterprise is,
Speaker 1: as you mentioned, a recorded label called Apple Records, and
Speaker 1: Apple Records is the venue through which some of the
Speaker 1: biggest Beatles albums ever get released.
Speaker 3: That's right, I mean their earlier stuff, Rubbert Soul, Revolver,
Speaker 3: help you know, all their musical film work and their
Speaker 3: early singles like I Want to Hold Your Hand and
Speaker 3: things like that I think weren't always released on full
Speaker 3: length albums. They were kind of singles back then that
Speaker 3: would still have been under the control of Capitol Records
Speaker 3: or I think Parlophone I think was the English imprint
Speaker 3: of Capital Correct me if I'm wrong, ridiculous historians. But
Speaker 3: that was out of their hands, but they could start fresh.
Speaker 3: Some of their most important and kind of boundary pushing
Speaker 3: work was released by Apple, and that includes Yellow Submarine,
Speaker 3: Abbey Road, and let It Be Yes, which.
Speaker 2: Are absolute bangers. By the way, for the record, for
Speaker 2: the record, whatever, we'll keep you do it.
Speaker 1: So they come up with this amazing pine Apple Core.
Speaker 1: They release this green Apple logo as their first trademark.
Speaker 1: By this point it's nineteen sixty nine, and this logo
Speaker 1: becomes iconic. People recognize it, and some of the people
Speaker 1: who recognize it, well, they say, we also have our
Speaker 1: own idea about Apple, and we're mad.
Speaker 2: At you guys.
Speaker 3: Well, I mean, you know, today I think people associate
Speaker 3: Apple and the Apple logo or an image of an
Speaker 3: Apple with a pretty significantly massive computer company, a technology
Speaker 3: company Apple.
Speaker 2: Which wasn't around in the sixties. Well, it wasn't around
Speaker 2: in the sixties.
Speaker 3: It was a startup more or less, you know, by
Speaker 3: Steve Jobs and Steve Wozniak, you know, in their garage
Speaker 3: in Silicon Valley there in San Francisco area. But today
Speaker 3: definitely much more of a household name, especially when associated
Speaker 3: with that particular fruit here in the United States and
Speaker 3: really in the rest of the world. Maybe there's some
Speaker 3: folks in Britain that still think about Apple Records and
Speaker 3: Apple Core, but probably not to the degree that Apple Computers,
Speaker 3: you know, kind of took over the mantle for that brand.
Speaker 1: And get this, I love this point. Get this, folks,
Speaker 1: if you are the average person looking up Apple Core,
Speaker 1: you're probably looking it up on your iPhone.
Speaker 3: Yeah, oh a million percent. I mean, that's the level
Speaker 3: of ubiquity that Apple Computer is established. Just an absolute
Speaker 3: cultural zeitgeist owner, you know, from the moment the ip
Speaker 3: as far back as the iPod, you know, I mean,
Speaker 3: coining terms, absolutely revolutionizing the handheld computing device market. You know,
Speaker 3: before it was like BlackBerry was kind of the only
Speaker 3: game in town, and then the iPhone came in and
Speaker 3: just blew the lid off of.
Speaker 2: All of it.
Speaker 3: Today they are a three trillion dollar company that was
Speaker 3: as I said, in those house in days salad days,
Speaker 3: I guess of the origination of the company, and Steve
Speaker 3: and Steve were working in their garage in nineteen seventy six.
Speaker 3: But nineteen seventy four, I believe, is when Let It
Speaker 3: Be came out. So at this point Apple Records and
Speaker 3: Apple Core still very much the only game in town.
Speaker 1: Yeah yeah, and Apple Computer Incorporated, as you said, it gets
Speaker 1: founded in nineteen seventy six, so this is several years
Speaker 1: after this, Like this is like seven years after the
Speaker 1: green Apple logo of nineteen sixty nine, and it's pretty
Speaker 1: much a decade after the exist of Apple Core is
Speaker 1: created by the Beatles.
Speaker 3: That logo, by the way, was inspired by a super
Speaker 3: famous painting by the surrealist Belgian artist Renee mcgreet. Paul
Speaker 3: McCartney had seen this in a gallery show in London
Speaker 3: and got the inspiration for designing that logo, you know
Speaker 3: the one. It's like the dude's head that's got the
Speaker 3: apple kind of floating in space.
Speaker 2: Yeah, yeah, yeah, it's a really good painting. It's wonderful.
Speaker 1: Macgret's fantastic and unbeknownst to our British musicians here double
Speaker 1: Steves as we're going to call them. When they started
Speaker 1: their business, they created, as you said, the concept of
Speaker 1: Apple in Steve Jobs's garage, and their first logo for
Speaker 1: Apple the Computer Company was, you know, sort of a
Speaker 1: pretty simple sketch of Isaac Newton from earlier sitting under
Speaker 1: an apple tree, and then later they replaced it with
Speaker 1: what we acknowledge as the old school logo, the nineteen
Speaker 1: seventy seven rainbow striped apple. Some cheeky monkey took a
Speaker 1: bite out of.
Speaker 2: It, a little devil. Where do you go? Let me
Speaker 2: add him? Where is he? Right?
Speaker 1: So they all love puns, right, This is a fun
Speaker 1: fact you found courtesy of our friends over at trade Markia.
Speaker 1: Shout out to I'm RuSHA chatti one hundred percent Apple core.
Speaker 1: As we mentioned, the pun being core of the apple.
Speaker 1: But when it comes to Apple computers and their logo,
Speaker 1: that bite that's taken out, you know, be.
Speaker 2: It e or is it b yt?
Speaker 3: Like a a unit of computer data and even Apple
Speaker 3: core though right this a core is a part of
Speaker 3: a processor, of a computer process. Oh nice, And I'm
Speaker 3: not sure if that terminology was used back in those
Speaker 3: early days, but today, if you have a really powerful processor,
Speaker 3: it's referred to as having multiple cores, which are like
Speaker 3: the processing you know, portions of those circuits.
Speaker 4: I would say I would guess that core was used
Speaker 4: back in those days because it's kind of like similar
Speaker 4: to how you would scrib like a power planner or book.
Speaker 4: That's also sure a million Yes, I'm guessing that that
Speaker 4: was would have been around the whole time.
Speaker 2: That's exactly right, it's where the power lies. Sounds like
Speaker 2: it's time for max with the facts.
Speaker 3: What is that seeking in the phone and peaceful in knowledge?
Speaker 2: It's just for you right now, there it was. It
Speaker 2: feels so good to be back, it really does.
Speaker 1: While we're walking out the puns, let's also point out
Speaker 1: some more wordplay. Corp co r p s of course
Speaker 1: pronounced core also denotes a large military movement. Shout out
Speaker 1: to Camel cor Yeah, corporation.
Speaker 2: So of course. So we're just saying it's well written.
Speaker 3: It is absolutely and in a press conference that the
Speaker 3: Beatles held in nineteen sixty eight to announce the founding
Speaker 3: of this organization, John Lennon described Apple Core as being
Speaker 3: a company we're setting up involving records, is what he
Speaker 3: would have said. Films and electronics m So there's definitely
Speaker 3: already some overlap in what apple Core is setting out
Speaker 3: to do. We're gonna get into whether or not they
Speaker 3: actually did it or not, and what the Steves are
Speaker 3: coming up with that technology side, you know, for them,
Speaker 3: electronics and technology.
Speaker 2: I mean, they're very much hand in hand.
Speaker 1: Yeah, And unfortunately, as we as we know and as
Speaker 1: history will later prove, the Beatles, despite being a tremendously
Speaker 1: fantastic musical force together, they had a lot of clashes
Speaker 1: of personality and fame brought with it some complications, some arguments,
Speaker 1: some loggerheads, some I think people give you'll go oh
Speaker 1: no a hard time, but right right, they had some
Speaker 1: they had some internal issues and they're as a result
Speaker 1: of this, the tensions in the group, you know, it
Speaker 1: didn't help the mission of apple Core.
Speaker 3: They should have spent more time with the Maharishiogi to
Speaker 3: kind of mellow out and stop being so tense at
Speaker 3: each other, y'all.
Speaker 2: Yeah, yeah, maybe right.
Speaker 1: There's also the fact, and we say this with great affection,
Speaker 1: we're obviously all of us are big Beatles fans. Here,
Speaker 1: there's also the fact that these guys are musicians, They're
Speaker 1: not execs.
Speaker 2: They're not C suite types.
Speaker 1: They don't they haven't gone to you know, Harvard Business
Speaker 1: School or whatever.
Speaker 2: They don't know how to run a company like this.
Speaker 2: But they do no music.
Speaker 3: And like I said, some really great artists were released
Speaker 3: under the Apple Records Moniker. But they also were attempting
Speaker 3: to kind of forge into that electronics or kind of
Speaker 3: technology sector with a dude they knew who was one
Speaker 3: of their engineers.
Speaker 2: At Apple Studios, a.
Speaker 3: Guy by the name of Magic Alex Martis, great name, Yeah,
Speaker 3: I mean the magic is in quotes. But he had
Speaker 3: gone to great lengths renovating the Beatles Studios, making it
Speaker 3: up to the current standards of recording technology, which was
Speaker 3: a very expensive job, costing in the neighborhood of one
Speaker 3: point five million pounds. But that studio went under as well.
Speaker 3: And as we will find out, Martis also had some
Speaker 3: other kind of hucksterry tricks up his sleeve.
Speaker 2: Yeah.
Speaker 1: Yeah, it turns out that you get in a tricky
Speaker 1: situation when you hire people based on your friendship versus
Speaker 1: you know, their proven skills, right, it's a big trustful
Speaker 1: They start something called the Apple Boutique Shop. This does
Speaker 1: not work well. It closes within just a year of launching.
Speaker 1: And they also had, like you said, well, they had
Speaker 1: Apple Films, which never really got off the ground floor.
Speaker 1: Apple Electronics unfortunately had to shut down because Martis practiced
Speaker 1: a different sort of magic and being very diplomatic.
Speaker 2: There, yeah, the magic of bullshit.
Speaker 1: Right, Yes, this is where we uh, this is where
Speaker 1: we thanked Tim Kaufman over at far Out magazine dot
Speaker 1: co dot UK, who really cool.
Speaker 3: I just started following them on all the platforms and
Speaker 3: it's just a really great publication. But they have an
Speaker 3: article called Let's see Magic. Alex Martis the engineer who
Speaker 3: promised the Beatles the world. And this guy had some
Speaker 3: kind of he fancied himself a bit of an inventor
Speaker 3: and had, you know, all these ideas that never really
Speaker 3: made it past the prototype stage. And then includes a
Speaker 3: guitar that he built for John Lennon that, when looked
Speaker 3: at from a certain angle, as described by this far article,
Speaker 3: resembles something in the way of a children's And you know,
Speaker 3: he had other little, you know, pie in the sky
Speaker 3: invention ideas, none of which ever made it to production.
Speaker 1: Right, Like he he impressed John Lennon with something you
Speaker 1: called the Nothing Box which was a little plastic box
Speaker 1: with these lights that would randomly blink. And then he
Speaker 1: told Candles he could build a seventy two track tape machine.
Speaker 2: It's really weird, which if you're a.
Speaker 3: Music nerd, you know that like the Beatles, early stuff
Speaker 3: was done on four track tape and that it had
Speaker 3: to innovate in tons of ways by like bounce it's
Speaker 3: called bouncing, or he records to multiple things and squish
Speaker 3: it down on one track and then record those again
Speaker 3: to another. It's like moving things around him and doubling
Speaker 3: them up to make room for more empty tracks. But
Speaker 3: then you had eight track and then twenty four track.
Speaker 3: Is what the kind of standard of the day is
Speaker 3: because there's a finite amount of space on two inch
Speaker 3: magnetic tape, and so promising something like seventy two tracks,
Speaker 3: maybe it's possible, but you would also be inherently cutting
Speaker 3: down on the modelity of each individual track because of
Speaker 3: the fact there's only so much data that can be
Speaker 3: written to a piece of magnetic tape like that. So
Speaker 3: what he was promising wasn't possible even by today's standards.
Speaker 1: Right, Yeah, it was a little bit of a pie
Speaker 1: in the sky. Let me sell you a bridge situation.
Speaker 1: We know that eventually he ended up losing Apple the
Speaker 1: Beatles company something like three hundred thousand pounds sterling. In
Speaker 1: recent numbers that would be that would be over yeah,
Speaker 1: that'd be over six point five million pounds. It was
Speaker 1: not a good look. Dude, magic martist. He's so interesting.
Speaker 1: He later gets into like selling bulletproof vehicles to dictators.
Speaker 3: It's one recent yeah, after he parts ways with the
Speaker 3: Beatles because they kick him to the carb when they
Speaker 3: finally realized that he's a con artist. So in nineteen
Speaker 3: seventy eight, Apple Core, it was just the holding company
Speaker 3: for the Beatles and also what they've got their record
Speaker 3: label apped up into, filed a lawsuit against This is
Speaker 3: the inciting incident of our story against the then up
Speaker 3: and coming Apple Computers for wait for it, trademark infringement.
Speaker 3: The trademarking question being that image of an apple, though
Speaker 3: very stylistically different, like you know, the apple that the
Speaker 3: Beatles use is photo realistic, you know, like a green apple,
Speaker 3: and the one that Apple used was more stylized, kind
Speaker 3: of a two dimensional, you know, sort of shape based design.
Speaker 2: With a cheeky little bite. Where do you go So
Speaker 2: this is this.
Speaker 1: Is a serious, high stakes legal disagreement. There is so
Speaker 1: much money on the line, not even counting celebrity, and
Speaker 1: the fact that on one side of this argument we
Speaker 1: have some of the most powerful musicians in the world.
Speaker 1: The thing is they weren't operating in the same businesses,
Speaker 1: not really.
Speaker 2: Yeah.
Speaker 3: Well, although apple Core did set out to have a
Speaker 3: technology wing, as we know, Magic Martis screwed that all
Speaker 3: the heck, and so that wasn't really a thing anymore.
Speaker 3: None of that business was viable. They were not operating
Speaker 3: in that space. The only remaining viable part of that
Speaker 3: business was the music being released on Apple Records. So
Speaker 3: that is kind of becomes the rub here, right, because
Speaker 3: the question then becomes what is technology? You know, what
Speaker 3: is music technology? And where does the crossover between these
Speaker 3: two business exist?
Speaker 2: And that's the question that gets litigated for quite a while.
Speaker 1: Yeah, yeah, it goes all the way up to nineteen
Speaker 1: eighty one, and they eventually, these two giants, right because
Speaker 1: Apple Computers is growing year over year at this point,
Speaker 1: they eventually settle and they say, look, let's demarcate everybody's
Speaker 1: respective turf. You are Apple Core, you do Apple Records.
Speaker 1: We promise you, guys, we super duper pinky swear that
Speaker 1: we are not going to enter into the music business.
Speaker 1: So long as you guys promise us super duper pinky
Speaker 1: style that you are not going to enter into the computers, like,
Speaker 1: don't try to build computers. We won't make a record label.
Speaker 1: Good game, exactly.
Speaker 3: You know, as long as you're not putting stuff out
Speaker 3: into the music space, then we are not going to
Speaker 3: put stuff out into the technology space. Never the twain
Speaker 3: shall meet. At this point, it seems relatively cut and dry.
Speaker 3: You know, we don't make records, you don't make computers.
Speaker 3: But the problem is that within the idea of making computers,
Speaker 3: what we know is where the real money is is
Speaker 3: in the software. And as technology improves, more things become
Speaker 3: possible within the operating system and the software of an
Speaker 3: Apple Macintosh computer, and that eventually does start to dip
Speaker 3: its toes into the music space, even before things like
Speaker 3: iTunes in the iPod.
Speaker 2: What happens first, that's right, that's right. I love this.
Speaker 1: Can we get a sound cue? Can we introduce you
Speaker 1: to the Musical Instrument Digital Interface aka street name the MIDI.
Speaker 3: MIDI is so fascinating because it was a it's a
Speaker 3: computer standard, or really just a digit electronic standard. It's
Speaker 3: a particular type of jack connection that has a certain
Speaker 3: number of pins that can pass what's called CC information
Speaker 3: or control change information through from a computer like a
Speaker 3: Apple Macintosh, or a sequencer, which might be a standalone
Speaker 3: device that can send information to it through a standardized
Speaker 3: connection into hardware synthesizers of the time.
Speaker 2: And you can.
Speaker 3: Literally program those synthesizers to do things from a remote place,
Speaker 3: you know, from a remote piece of equipment, and you
Speaker 3: can have multiple of them connected. And the thing I
Speaker 3: think is so neat about MIDI is that to this
Speaker 3: day it hasn't changed. Like you still buy interfaces, recording
Speaker 3: interfaces or mini controllers what they call them. They literally
Speaker 3: call them that that have the same exact connection that
Speaker 3: can connect up to a synthesizer that came out in
Speaker 3: the eighties.
Speaker 1: Yeah, well said, and this is you know, instantly, I
Speaker 1: think a lot of us playing along at home felt
Speaker 1: that felt that pool of nostalgia MIDI stuff is just
Speaker 1: so cool. I love hearing it. It's fun, you know.
Speaker 1: I also like a lot of hip hop that leverages MIDI.
Speaker 1: Just to be honest, it's a banger, But you're right,
Speaker 1: You're absolutely right. Now, the overlap there, the implacable pace
Speaker 1: of technological innovation, it led into again some overstepping of turf,
Speaker 1: at least in the opinion of the Beatles Apple Core.
Speaker 1: So they come back post MIDI and as this technology
Speaker 1: is spreading throughout the world and throughout Apple Computers, and
Speaker 1: the Beatles crew says, look, the sound capabilities of the Macintosh,
Speaker 1: just the fact that the noises it can make, they
Speaker 1: are a breach of our earlier agreement. We can't believe you, guys,
Speaker 1: Pinky promised and then did us this way, so fast forward,
Speaker 1: it's this is nineteen ninety one at this point, and Noel,
Speaker 1: as you pointed out, the case goes all the way
Speaker 1: to the High Court in London and they're like.
Speaker 2: The supreme court of that part of the world.
Speaker 1: Correct, well yeah, yeah, yeah, And they're they're grappling with
Speaker 1: this question that we that we sort of played with
Speaker 1: just a few seconds ago. They have to ask if
Speaker 1: this really is a violation of that nineteen eighty one settlement.
Speaker 3: One hundred percent because of the fact that now Apple
Speaker 3: Computers was doing stuff in their operating system, in their
Speaker 3: software that made these computers capable of interfacing with musical
Speaker 3: devices musical equipm. Technically they were in violation of I
Speaker 3: don't know, some aspect of that agreement. It's really weird
Speaker 3: and convoluted because they certainly weren't putting out music and
Speaker 3: selling music products. So it's really a tough thing, and
Speaker 3: I understand why it made it so far in the
Speaker 3: court systems. Yeah, yeah, because it really it really comes
Speaker 3: down to some I hate to say it, but a
Speaker 3: little bit of hair splitting and a little bit of
Speaker 3: philosophy and perspective. Ultimately, the court says, all right, Apple
Speaker 3: computers are not purposely out to drink your proverbial milkshake.
Speaker 3: The primary function of the Macintosh is to process data. Now,
Speaker 3: can people use that to make music, sure, but they
Speaker 3: can also use it however they wish as the end user.
Speaker 3: Apple is not making people create any kind of music,
Speaker 3: and they're not even really marketing it in that way,
Speaker 3: you know.
Speaker 2: I Mean.
Speaker 3: It's just the thing about technology that's so interesting is
Speaker 3: it is inevitably going to evolve to do things that
Speaker 3: other things have held the market on, you know what
Speaker 3: I mean, Like even with like AI, now so much
Speaker 3: of the debate around that technology. This is not that different.
Speaker 3: It's just a different time. Where like when synthesizers first
Speaker 3: came out, people were afraid they were going to take
Speaker 3: the jobs of musicians, you know, because it was like
Speaker 3: a robo orchestra.
Speaker 2: That didn't end up being the case.
Speaker 3: But a similar thing the debate is happening around AI
Speaker 3: about the jobs that it could displace. But when you
Speaker 3: start to kind of like try to nail down what
Speaker 3: is a computer capable of what does it do? That
Speaker 3: question becomes kind of moot because it can do all
Speaker 3: kinds of things. It can do whatever you program it
Speaker 3: to do. It's not inherently one thing. It can be
Speaker 3: many things to many people and professions. And you know
Speaker 3: sectors right right.
Speaker 1: It's sort of like let's say you sell Swiss army knives,
Speaker 1: unctional tools, a leatherman for instance, right, and then somebody
Speaker 1: else comes to you and says, hey, we agreed that.
Speaker 1: A scissors company comes to you and says we agreed
Speaker 1: that we're the ones in charge of scissors, and then
Speaker 1: you have to say, well, people can cut things with
Speaker 1: a knife, you know what I mean, Like, how is that?
Speaker 1: How is that on? Like how is that my responsibility.
Speaker 1: You know this, This does seem like a.
Speaker 3: Stretch, well exactly, and that's why you can't copyright or
Speaker 3: trademark technology as ancient and you know basic as a
Speaker 3: knife or a screw.
Speaker 2: Right, it is a tool.
Speaker 3: You can have different types of ones, and maybe you
Speaker 3: have like a multipurpose device like a Swiss army knife,
Speaker 3: and you're trademarking the look of it and the design
Speaker 3: of it.
Speaker 2: But no one can say I own the knife, you know,
Speaker 2: or I own the nail. Right.
Speaker 1: You can say you own a specific production method or
Speaker 1: manufacturing approach to a kind of knife, but you can't
Speaker 1: be like, I'm the King of knives, which would be
Speaker 1: funny but also pretty creepy if you meet someone who
Speaker 1: calls themselves the king of knives.
Speaker 3: We suggest that you know, there's a King of knives
Speaker 3: somewhere in Muskogee, Wisconsin or something.
Speaker 2: He's got TV commercials.
Speaker 5: I'm them the knife king, you know, I do like
Speaker 5: come to my knife palace.
Speaker 2: Yes, yes, I love a sharp customer.
Speaker 1: Oh geez, oh yeah no, so okay, we do know
Speaker 1: that Apple computers still had a bit of a cheeky
Speaker 1: sense of humor. Here they're nineteen ninety one operating software
Speaker 1: has a sound file audit called We'll spell it for
Speaker 1: you first, s O s U M I.
Speaker 2: How would you pronounce that? So Sumi.
Speaker 3: It's like a tiny orange right now, that's just satsuma.
Speaker 3: Wait a minute, is this a cheeky little joke? Yeah,
Speaker 3: lawyer jokes.
Speaker 2: Assume me just do it.
Speaker 1: And they could get away with it if they're doing
Speaker 1: hair splitting legal eese, because they can say, oh, it's
Speaker 1: just an inspiring name, and we double check to make
Speaker 1: sure you don't own the way that's spelled. Why are
Speaker 1: you guys mad? So it's it's a it's a prank war,
Speaker 1: you know, and this is just like, it's a great story.
Speaker 1: But we do know that they can't leave it as is, right,
Speaker 1: so they have to figure out a sort of second covenant,
Speaker 1: a second pinky swear settlement.
Speaker 3: Yeah, and this agreement, while acknowledging the changing dynamics of
Speaker 3: a computers were capable of, it did kind of broaden
Speaker 3: the language a little bit, and it said that Apple
Speaker 3: computers could use that logo for computers, data processing, telecommunications,
Speaker 3: but excluded music products, which is super weird because again,
Speaker 3: it can be a music product given someone writing code
Speaker 3: that would allow it to do that, or creating some
Speaker 3: sort of peripheral that it would allow to do that,
Speaker 3: some sort of device that could be connected to it.
Speaker 3: This was never gonna last.
Speaker 2: Yeah.
Speaker 1: Yeah, this is at best a band aid and it
Speaker 1: feels like everybody had to know that going in so
Speaker 1: while they're trying to make friends and calm the waters,
Speaker 1: as it were, Apple computers. According to reports, they pay
Speaker 1: off Apple Core. They give them about twenty six point
Speaker 1: five million US dollars and then they say to your point, no, look,
Speaker 1: we're not going to sell quote physical music materials. However,
Speaker 1: ssume me is still a system alert sound on this
Speaker 1: day on.
Speaker 2: Max Yeah, carried in there.
Speaker 3: It's not used, but I think it's like a as
Speaker 3: they update the system software over time, some of the
Speaker 3: old things stick around, almost like as like a little
Speaker 3: nod to their past. And I think if you look
Speaker 3: in that folder where all the systems sound effects are,
Speaker 3: you'll still find sasumi.
Speaker 1: Yeah. And this is the work of a employee from
Speaker 1: Apple called Jim Reeks, called that because it's his name.
Speaker 5: Uh.
Speaker 1: He created the sound alerts on Apple System seven and
Speaker 1: he originally wanted to uh. He originally wanted to name
Speaker 1: that alert let it beep.
Speaker 2: It's good. That's good, So assume he's better.
Speaker 3: Though, it's so much more cheeky and like underhanded, you know,
Speaker 3: let it Beep is almost showing your hand too much.
Speaker 3: And he realized that, knowing that it probably wouldn't pass
Speaker 3: legal muster.
Speaker 1: Yeah, and so he went with Sosumi. And then he
Speaker 1: did exactly what we were describing earlier. He's like, oh, no,
Speaker 1: it's just a name that sounds kind of Japanese. It
Speaker 1: has nothing to do with music. You guys are being weird, Yeah, exactly.
Speaker 5: Oh it's so funny, yes, sir, oh man, that's so
Speaker 5: fun So we've been hinting at all the while, like
Speaker 5: like Apple, you know, the record company, the Beatles organization.
Speaker 2: Clearly very sensitive about this.
Speaker 3: This idea of Apple computers, you know, being in the
Speaker 3: music business, and it seems like for the most part,
Speaker 3: they arrived at an agreement that was more along the
Speaker 3: lines of, you guys can't do record label stuff, right,
Speaker 3: that's our thing. You know, we're gonna let the MIDI
Speaker 3: stuff slide, you know whatever. We understand the changing landscape
Speaker 3: of technology and all that, but you guys can't.
Speaker 2: Distribute and put out recorded music.
Speaker 3: When did that change, y'all? I think we can, I
Speaker 3: think we can conjecture.
Speaker 5: Yeah.
Speaker 2: Yeah.
Speaker 1: Also, of course you can't make an Apple clarinet or whatever.
Speaker 1: That would be a bridge too far. That's a CD
Speaker 1: called music product. But as you said, the seescape changes
Speaker 1: the tide shift once again. It's two thousand and three.
Speaker 1: Apple Computer goes to the world at large and says, hey,
Speaker 1: we have this idea for a thing called iTunes. Now
Speaker 1: you can go to you macadherens. You can go to
Speaker 1: the iTunes music store. You can buy individual songs or tracks,
Speaker 1: and you can copy it on to your iPod. It's
Speaker 1: the new walkman. You can take it with you wherever
Speaker 1: you want to go.
Speaker 3: This isn't just a clever idea, Ben, This changes everything
Speaker 3: every I mean, right now where we sit in twenty
Speaker 3: twenty five, the debate about like how much artists are
Speaker 3: making has nothing to do with record sales anymore, has
Speaker 3: to do with streams. Everybody you know knows that I'm
Speaker 3: stating the obvious, But like Apple were the first ones
Speaker 3: to have the clout to kind of push this stuff
Speaker 3: out in the world, and then they released a piece
Speaker 3: of hardware in the iPod that you also had to
Speaker 3: have to play in this ecosystem.
Speaker 2: Mm hmmm.
Speaker 1: Yeah, they built the sandbox, right, so you have to
Speaker 1: if you're a musician, you have to play the game
Speaker 1: with Apple and iTunes. Apple Core is still around in
Speaker 1: two thousand and three, and they are super not happy
Speaker 1: about this. They sue Apple Computer again.
Speaker 3: Understandably at this point, man, I'm kind of in the
Speaker 3: Apple records or apple Core camp. I mean, this is
Speaker 3: clearly Apple Computers taking a big swing. Somebody had to
Speaker 3: know in their legal department they were testing this also
Speaker 3: knowing that at this point Apple Core is just not
Speaker 3: as powerful an entity as they are, they can afford
Speaker 3: to fight this in court, and they do big time.
Speaker 2: Yeah. Yeah, for years.
Speaker 1: It's not until two thousand and seven that the respective
Speaker 1: apples reach a confidential settlement. We don't know exactly what
Speaker 1: they came to terms on, but if you read the
Speaker 1: scuttle butt, you'll see strong hints that Apple the computer company,
Speaker 1: yet again paid apple Core, the record company. They said,
Speaker 1: let us just buy the trademark.
Speaker 3: They cut the legs out from apple Core entirely though, Man,
Speaker 3: you think about that like that. Now Apple Core has
Speaker 3: to license the use of that name and that trademark
Speaker 3: back from Apple record. It's not to say they didn't,
Speaker 3: of course, get a gajillion dollars, but if I'm not mistaken,
Speaker 3: the first example of this out in the world was
Speaker 3: Beatles Rock Band, which was a video game where you
Speaker 3: could play Beatles songs for the first time and sing
Speaker 3: and all that stuff. Guitar hero but with you could
Speaker 3: also play bass and drums. You guys know what this is.
Speaker 3: And it appeared in the documentation for that game Beatles,
Speaker 3: you know, Apple Core with under exclusive license from Apple
Speaker 3: Computers more or less.
Speaker 2: And I might not be getting that quite right, but
Speaker 2: it's along those lines.
Speaker 1: Yeah, yeah, And this is this is where we go
Speaker 1: to at Liss Records. There's a great article you found
Speaker 1: from an author calling themselves Patty, and this breaks down
Speaker 1: the battle of the Apples. And they put it this way.
Speaker 1: They say, it's not merely a legal saga. It is
Speaker 1: quote a symphony that echoes the evolution of technology and
Speaker 1: the music industry, which I think is a beautiful piece
Speaker 1: of writing.
Speaker 3: Oh, absolutely very well put. And can I also say
Speaker 3: that I just think this is another really good quote
Speaker 3: from the Atlas records piece the question and one we've
Speaker 3: been asking that's post very eloquently here. The question of
Speaker 3: where one company's territory ends and another's begins is a
Speaker 3: perpetual challenge in industries marked by rapid innovation. The Beatles
Speaker 3: and related acts music finally made its way to digital
Speaker 3: music stores, including iTunes in twenty ten.
Speaker 1: Yeah, and this is so here's what's amazing. Here's why
Speaker 1: I love this story so much. It is a story
Speaker 1: that is only going to grow more important in precedent
Speaker 1: as time goes on, as technology continues to evolve.
Speaker 3: One hundred percent, the Beatles' music is as important and
Speaker 3: iconic today as it ever has been, if not more so.
Speaker 3: I mean, so many artists came from influenced by the Beatles,
Speaker 3: you know, music, recording technology, innovations, recording production techniques. I
Speaker 3: mean so much of that stuff has the Beatles to
Speaker 3: thank for it, and of course including their incredible producer
Speaker 3: and really like the fifth Beatle, George Martin.
Speaker 2: So it's important in this case. Really.
Speaker 3: A trademarquia dot com article points out it highlights the
Speaker 3: importance of trademarks. There are values as intellectual property and
Speaker 3: the necessity of protecting them.
Speaker 1: And with this speaking of thanking people, thank you, fellow
Speaker 1: Ridiculous Historians for joining us for today's episode. Thanks also
Speaker 1: to our super producer, mister Max Williams.
Speaker 3: Yeah, thanks to Alex Williams who composed our theme and
Speaker 3: Christopher Hasiotis and eaves Jeff Coates here in spirit.
Speaker 1: Thanks to the rude dudes over a Ridiculous Crib. If
Speaker 1: you dig this show, you'll love theirs and Noel, thank
Speaker 1: you as always, and thanks for being our research associated
Speaker 1: on this woman.
Speaker 2: It was a lot of fun.
Speaker 3: It was super a lot of fun, and there'll be
Speaker 3: will be more. I love doing stuff in the music space,
Speaker 3: and I think we're going to see more of that
Speaker 3: stuff coming from me in the future. But thanks for
Speaker 3: taking this journey together, Ben, and also of course Max.
Speaker 2: We'll see you next time, folks.
Speaker 3: For more podcasts from iHeartRadio, visit the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts,
Speaker 3: or wherever you listen to your favorite shows.