Pirate Bay Announces Sale to Swedish Company For $7.8 Million, dies an hour later
 

The Pirate Bay is to be bought for $7.8 million by Global Gaming Factory X, a Swedish company specializing in internet café management software, the company has announced. As well as taking over the controversial brand, GGF has also bought Peerialism, a small IT company with roots at Sweden's Royal Institute of Technology, which has developed a new file sharing technology. The acquisitions mean that GGF will be at the heart of 'the international digital distribution market,' allowing it to introduce a new pay model for file sharing.

Update: Global Gaming Factory have confirmed (according to Dagens Nyheter, a respected news outlet in Sweden) that "Users of The Pirate Bay will have to pay to download music and movies. Those who seed material will be able to profit from doing so."

That's retarded.

As you remarked on ICQ, it's possible that traffic spikes have brought them down. However, they have been perfectly fine during previous spikes, e.g. just after the creators received their sentences.

It still works fine for me - the site and torrents I'm downloading.

This blew my mind. Oh well.

I can't blame them, but it's a total sell out based on their previous actions.

Post updated with disastrous news.

Eee, that's a swizz and no mistake. :(

The internet being the internet, however, means that people will just move to a different site. I'll be very surprised if members of TPB don't start up a new site to fill the void.

Horrible idea, since many artists couldn't care less if their work was pirated.

More: http://thepiratebay.org/blog/164

I didn't have to pay for my Rise Against album download.