Music companies seek to scupper online pirates

Several top music outfits, including Sony and EMI, have joined forces in the latest attempt to combat music piracy over the internet. In an provocative manoeuvre, the companies have vowed to only release songs that no one would wish to download in the first place, thereby effectively ending the illegal trade in high-class musical product.

Music piracy has featured in some major headlines over the past month. Dashing young rock blade Elton John was appalled to find that copies of his forthcoming album Hell Toupee were available to download before he had actually started to write it. Sir John was at a loss to explain this phenomenon. "It must have been done with computers or something," he offered before getting straight back to simpering around Italian haute couture ladyboy Donatella Versace.

Meanwhile, demure songstress Madonna's attempt to scupper marauding music pirates backfired in a spectacular manner earlier this week. Her record company distributed a number of "spoilers" over the internet which, although appearing to be full versions of her songs, were nothing more than a looped recording of Madge firing a broadside of verbal filth. Unfortunately, music fans immediately applauded the piece as yet another thrilling musical departure for the highly-talented Cockney chanteuse and have flocked in their millions to download it.

We asked chirpy music pundit Tony Blackburn for his views on this new "shite song" initiative. Speaking from the set of I'm an unemployed ex-celebrity — get me a TV job!, where he has spent several harrowing weeks in the Australian rainforest battling gamely to avoid the delirious sexual advances of Tara Palmer-Donkeyson, Blackburn told The Rockall Times: "Did I ever mention about the time my wife Tessa left me. Did I? Tessa, oh Tessa, why did you leave me?"

Hours later we were approached by Jonathan King's agent who said his client would be only too happy to offer our readers his entertaining analysis of the subject. Sadly, our voluntary code of conduct does not allow us to pay convicted paedophiles for their opinions on contemporary pop culture.

In the absence therefore of any coherent punditry, We here at The Rockall Times have decided that the new policy will do little to curb the amount of music being downloaded illegally. Our research shows that over 90 per cent of downloads from the Internet are either pornography or music, with a roughly 50/50 split between the two. Given that there are only so many times your average geek can masturbate in a 24-hour period without taking well-earned break to throw a few shapes and eat some pizza, we must conclude that such downloads will continue no matter what the quality of the music.