Sir Paul McCartney has said The Beatles catalog will officially reach the net sometime next year.

He did so with some very typical Paul speak. "It's all happening soon," the former cheeky mop top told Billboard.com. "Most of us are all sort of ready. The whole thing is primed, ready to go - there's just maybe one little sticking point left, and I think it's being cleared up as we speak, so it shouldn't be too long."

And then he kept going: "It's down to fine-tuning, but I'm pretty sure it'll be happening next year, 2008."

Official online retailers now sell tunes from the solo catalogs of John, Paul, George, and Ringo. But if you wanna download real Beatles songs on the net, you have no choice but to download them free of charge from a P2P file-sharing service.

Yes, The Beatles' record label - Apple Corps Ltd - has now settled its long-running trademark dispute with Steve Jobs' smug tech company - Apple Inc - but there are still "contractual" issues that must be ironed out between the Fab Four and retailers across the web. Plus, Sir Paul and company are dead set on serving up digital tunes in a way they won't regret.

"You've got to get these things right," Sir Paul prattled on. "You don't want to do something that's as cool as that and in three years' time you think, 'Oh God, why did we do that?!'"

While you're waiting for The Beatles catalog to hit the web, you can always buy some Zeppelin songs. ®

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