Strike the Jolly Roger – the scallywags have deserted The Pirate Bay. The file-sharing site’s $7.8m sale to Global Gaming Factory, a Swedish maker of software for internet cafés, marks the latest victory of sorts for record companies in their costly struggle against online piracy. The sale will provide TPB’s founders with enough loot to offset the $3.8m fine handed down after their conviction on copyright violations in April, but its swashbuckling days are over.

GGF’s plans to turn TPB into a legitimate file-sharing business look shaky – users deserted Napster and Kazaa, two of the internet’s original marauders, when they attempted similar transformations. Attempts to build a business at BitTorrent, a company formed around the technology that powers the TPB site, have also struggled. Investors pushed GGF’s stock price down more than 30 per cent on Wednesday on news that it would fund the acquisition of TPB and another file-sharing site by issuing new shares.