Pirate Bay To Become Legitimate Downloading Site

Music file-sharing website The Pirate Bay has been sold.

It is set to be transformed into a legal music site that sees artists and record labels get paid for the downloads they provide.

The Sweden-based website - whose four founders and hosts were sentenced to a year in jail and fined for copyright infringement offences in April - will be acquired by Swedish software company Global Gaming Factory X AB in August.

The Pirate Bay has been sold for 60 million Swedish SEK (£4.7 million), Global Gaming Factory X AB revealed in a statement.

Hans Pandeya, CEO of Global Gaming Factory X AB said that another new change would be faster downloads and increased sound quality for users.

"In order to live on, The Pirate Bay requires a new business model, which satisfies the requirements and needs of all parties, content providers, broadband operators, end users, and the judiciary," he explained.

"Content creators and providers need to control their content and get paid for it," he added. "File-sharers need faster downloads and better quality."

In their own statement, The Pirate Bay chiefs claimed that the ethos of the site would not change despite its new legal status.

"A lot of people are worried," they said. "We're not and you shouldn't be either! The right people with the right attitude and possibilities keep running the site.

"It's time to invite more people into the project, in a way that is secure and safe for everybody. We need that, or the site will die.

"The old crew is still around in different ways. We will also not stop being active in the politics of the internet – quite the opposite."

Thanks for the report to Nme.com.

Comments

[ThatCostsMoney]

wow.. this is gonna be wierd

[Spartan101400]

Then whats the point of "Pirate" Bay if there's no pirating?

[Quicksand15]

very good news. i don't understand why so many people think music is something for free...if the artist wants to give it away for free, it's a different topic of course.

[axlanian]

How does that even work?

[itchy guitar]

We better not have to pay.

[goon316]

Sad day, the Napster people said the same thing.

[fattypumbaa]

Well I'll take pirate bay off my bar thing. Oh well still got btjunkie, isohunt, soulseek, demonoid, dime, pornbits. I'll miss the pirate bay though. It was good to me.

[LifesSweetDrug]

No it hasn't been sold.

The company has to come up with the money with in four weeks to be sold, else tpb lives on.

Anyway if it does get sold, for the reported 8 million; a few weeks after it will be worthless as no one will want to use a legitimate site.

[nesveikuolis]

Simple - TPB R.I.P. 2003.11.23-2009.06.30
There will be more sites. Teh interwebs is powerfull

[vIsIbleNoIsE]

you hear the word "sellout" thrown around by douchebags about bands all the time, but THIS is a real sellout.

[acshadow25]

rename the e-bay? oh wait....

[WaveCaster97]

lol its like there arent 700 sites exactly like TPB or for that matter IRC is still around also, but still TPB had the coolest name

[deadlyMETAL]

fattypumbaa wrote:

Well I'll take pirate bay off my bar thing. Oh well still got btjunkie, isohunt, soulseek, demonoid, dime, pornbits. I'll miss the pirate bay though. It was good to me.

XD That went through my head too.

I really think TPB will die because of this, because the main attraction of the site is to get content you otherwise can't get (and some you can get but don't want to get with other methods) and for no cost. That very fact will change, and you'll lose the people who used it for those reasons, because they will look elsewhere - easier than fighting to go back to the way it was.

[the_white_bunny]

weak your going to have to pay for it...
killing the internet... lame

[loganpwns]

"Oh no,
I'm going to have to pay for music"

Seriously,
it doesn't cost that much

[maidenfan15]

I just use MP3va. It's legal, the qualities great and it's only $1 an album.

[Oli_]

loganpwns wrote:

"Oh no,
I'm going to have to pay for music"
Agreed
Download movies instead, the film industry sucks!

Seriously,
it doesn't cost that much

[WaveCaster97]

loganpwns wrote:

"Oh no,
I'm going to have to pay for music"

Seriously,
it doesn't cost that much

your entire post fails. first noone is going to have to pay for anything because of one website going down, and second you speak the words of a true spoiled brat of a kid, buy all 107GB of the music on my computer or go to college.. or download it all for free and still be able to pay for school hmmmm.
dosent cost much my ass

[\m/(-_-)\m/]

Oh well, Demonoid and Mininova work just as well.

[trendkill-]

LifesSweetDrug wrote:

No it hasn't been sold.

The company has to come up with the money with in four weeks to be sold, else tpb lives on.

Anyway if it does get sold, for the reported 8 million; a few weeks after it will be worthless as no one will want to use a legitimate site.

exactly there are already enough of those

[RCAlbright]

This is horrible, The Pirate Bay was the best for music and movies. :,(

[balussandro]

i found this very funny xD

[garrett5]

WaveCaster97 wrote:

loganpwns wrote:

"Oh no,
I'm going to have to pay for music"

Seriously,
it doesn't cost that much

your entire post fails. first noone is going to have to pay for anything because of one website going down, and second you speak the words of a true spoiled brat of a kid, buy all 107GB of the music on my computer or go to college.. or download it all for free and still be able to pay for school hmmmm.
dosent cost much my ass

What about the kids who were going to college before free Mp3 downloads?

[GuitarSymphony]

Are we going to be paying for our files in dubloons now? wtf.

[UnaLaguna]

One of the main points was that TPB DIDN'T give money to the record companies. Many pirates' justification for pirating was that they wanted to pay money to the artist through concerts etc, but not to the middleman.

It's difficult to see how this won't do what Napster did, unless there's a clever way of funding it which doesn't involve the end user paying (there would have to be an obscene amount of advertising to cover it all).

But who knows; maybe TPB will become bigger and better than ever. It's too early to say for sure. And if it does go the way of Napster, then the pirates will just migrate to other sites.

For each filesharing service that closes there are ten others.

[jacksonmetaller]

garrett5 wrote:

WaveCaster97 wrote:

loganpwns wrote:

"Oh no,
I'm going to have to pay for music"

Seriously,
it doesn't cost that much

your entire post fails. first noone is going to have to pay for anything because of one website going down, and second you speak the words of a true spoiled brat of a kid, buy all 107GB of the music on my computer or go to college.. or download it all for free and still be able to pay for school hmmmm.
dosent cost much my ass

What about the kids who were going to college before free Mp3 downloads?

before the internet existed people didn't listen to nearly as much music as they do now... think about it... $20 for a cd... that means if you want an entire discography from your favorite artist (most have around 10 cds) thats $200.. and that's only one artist. honestly i think anyone who's ignorant enough to say buying music is cheap, doesn't really listen to all that much music to begin with

[FearOfTheDuck]

People who download music for free are the scum of the earth, there's no excuse. And having vinyl and CD's is better because they're not just on your computer or whatever. If you really loved music you would buy the album and support the artist