A Beatles iPod: A Boomer's Dream

For Fortune, it's a business story. For Apple, it's a business deal. But for boomers like me, if the rumor is true that Apple is negotiating with the Beatles to sell their music on iTunes, it's a bittersweet moment. And the fact that AppleInsider reported that there may be a special Beatles version of the iPod in the works makes it more bittersweet still.

Just the headlines hinting at the Beatles' entrée into the digital world start the memories flowing. That first day I convinced my mother to take me to the store to let me buy the hit single, "She Loves You." My "I Love Paul" button (still wondering if I made the right choice or succumbed to peer pressure) is somewhere in the back of my closet. The hours we spent spinning Beatles records backward to catch what today a programmer would call an "Easter egg"—those secret decoder messages.

There are some fresh memories too, very much a part of this season. November 29 marked the anniversary of George Harrison's death five years ago. And on December 8, people from all over the world will come together to pray for peace and remember how John Lennon was gunned down outside his New York City apartment in 1980.

Today, if you go to the iTunes store and search on the Beatles, you'll get lots of choices, but the Beatles' recordings are not for sale in digital form. Tonight I listened to a few of the available tracks and thought how sad it would be for a generation to grow up thinking that, good as they might be, the Soundalike Beatles or the Beatles Revival Band were the way it was supposed to be.

To quote another great Sixties band, "it's been a long time comin'." Getting the real-deal Beatles into the hands of digital listeners and commemorating the band's extraordinary effect on the world with a special iPod gives boomers a cause to twist and shout. The only downside? A friend just wrote to tell me that, according to the Beatles' audio engineer, the digital version doesn't hold a candle to the original recording. Sigh.