We swear, stuff changes so quickly in Apple's world, it's not too difficult to get surprised by a blast from the past. Remember a couple of years ago when Apple had plans to open a string of "Apple Café" Internet coffeehouses? This was back in the Amelio Days, we reckon, when rather than focusing on creating outstanding products, the plan for Apple's turnaround seemed to be to release uninteresting, less-reliable computers while plastering the Apple logo on barely-related third-party ventures. Had that plan stayed on course (and assuming that Apple had the cash to keep burning through), we'd all be constantly rebooting our cheaply-constructed Power Mac 4400-derived generic-looking PCMacs while sipping Apple Java and keeping warm by the fire of a flaming PowerBook 5300+ ("Still no CD-ROM drive-- but now burns 50% longer!").

Hmm, we seem to have strayed from the point before we even got there. Okay, here's the thing: back when the Apple Café idea was being put together, Apple also agreed to have their name and logo branded onto a series of educational toys. The idea was that Apple's brand name conjured up images of education, since they had the educational computer market locked up pretty tight. Never mind that toys aren't computers; the brand's the thing. (Had this plan progressed, we wonder if we'd eventually have seen Apple Chalk and Apple Cafeteria Food?) If none of this rings a bell, you should feel lucky that things never got very far with these ideas. Anyway, the reason we bring it up is that the company who wanted to use the Apple brand on their educational toys was Marvel Enterprises (the same folks who came out with all those cool comic books), and they've just settled the financial issue of whether or not they actually had to pay Apple for the use of the name, since those educational toys never came out.

According to a Reuters story, things went like this: Marvel originally agreed to pay at least $3 million in royalties to Apple for the use of the name and logo, but soon after the agreement, Apple's "financial difficulties" made Marvel rethink the wisdom of connecting their products with Apple. They actually tried to get back their $1 million advance payment, but Apple held firm and said Marvel still owed them the remaining $2 million, whether they used the name or not. This was recently settled, and Marvel had to cough up another $1.5 million. And thus ends that debacle. Whew. Now excuse us, but it's getting chilly in here-- time to throw another 5300 on the fire.