I gather that the music and video sharing site Pirate Bay has been bought with the intention of steering it into the safe waters of legal downloading. It will probably maintain a faint presence for a while, but there are a number of reasons I'd suggest it's doomed. I ought to admit to an indirect interest here - as a writer, I can't sit back and watch people's work being stolen without feeling it's wrong. If people just copy the stuff I write without paying for it, I don't earn a living, simple as that. And I can't see the difference between doing it for words and doing it for music or video. So why is Pirate Bay going to sink as a legitimate download site? There'll certainly be, I suspect some reluctance from the people who own the material. Pirate Bay's attitude to date has not been one to encourage them - it's hard to see what the music and video people gain by playing nice. But I think there's a double problem from the side of people who ...