A Tale of Two Apples ⇥ macworld.com

Great take on the Apple/Beats deal from Macworld’s Jason Snell:

The evidence is clear: Apple is taking Steve Jobs’s advice to heart and not remaining static in the wake of his death. I have no idea if Apple and Beats will end up being a good match—I’m interested to see if Apple truly embraces music subscriptions, or keeps Beats Music at arm’s length from iTunes. What I’m excited by is the fact that the Beats acquisition is not a move that Apple would have made a few years ago.

One of the common accusations that I’ve heard about Tim Cook is the assumption by some that he’s essentially coasting on the legacy of Steve Jobs. The fact that this deal is completely Cook’s, and one that is so out of character for the company is not, in of itself, an indication that it’s a great deal or anything. But it demonstrates that Cook isn’t scared of doing things that aren’t necessarily in Apple’s typical post-1997 playbook.