All parties involved in the so-called Beatles/iTunes deal have now all denied any talks taking place. Apple Inc. has flatly denied the rumors and have called them ‘unsubstantiated speculation’. A spokesman from Apple also commented ‘this is not news nor is it a scoop’. Enough said.

The Beatles’ label Apple Corps and parent company EMI have both refused to comment on the matter.

British newspapers brought this story to light over the weekend when they published the rumors.

The reported deal is rumored to be worth over $400 million. At that amount, Apple would have to sell around 41 million full Beatles albums to earn back that amount. That’s a lot of music.

To speculate (and I love to speculate), I’d still expect a deal to shakedown at some point in 2008. Even Sir Paul himself has commented that the Beatles’ catalog should be available sometime this year.

[via Billboard]

Rumor has it that Sir Paul McCartney has reached a deal with Apple to offer up the Beatles catalog in the iTunes store. The deal is worth a reported $400 million. That’s big bucks… Not that Sir Paul is hurting for cash.

I can hear you saying ‘How much of a cut does Ringo get I wonder?’ Well, there are many parties that are bound to benefit from the deal. Including the families of the deceased Harrison and Lennon… Ringo (who is not dead yet as far as I can tell) and Michael Jackson also stand to bring in a tidy profit.

Rumors have been floating around on this for quite some time now… This one is reported to be the ‘real deal’…Sir Paul has even been quoted as saying the catalog of music would appear online sometime in 2008. It’s probably just a matter of time before we see ‘Yellow Submarine’  popping up on iTunes. Guaranteed it will be the news of the day when it happens.

[via arstechnica]