Garageband.com announced that they signed a deal in April 2003 to share the name “GarageBand” with Apple. Apple paid the Web site an undisclosed one-time fee to use the name for GarageBand, a digital music-maker that’s the latest addition to iLife, which was updated on Tuesday. Garageband.com retains its original rights to use the term for other products and services.
Garageband.com offers free legal MP3s from over 200,000 independent musicians. Listeners vote for their favorites, and since 1999, 13 of the site’s highest-ranking bands have score deals with major music labels.
“We’ve always shared Apple’s goal of empowering musicians, and today we’re excited to share with them our name,” said Ali Partovi, CEO of Garageband.com. “Now, any musician can create music on Apple’s state-of-the-art GarageBand software and promote their recordings on Garageband.com’s award-winning web services.”