New York, May 19: Bankrupt Internet song-swapping service Napster, skewered by the courts for encouraging piracy, may be on the verge of a comeback through a marriage with Pressplay, the 'New York Times' reported today. Universal Music Group and Sony Music Entertainment are close to a deal to sell their struggling online music service to Roxio, the company that bought the remains of Napster in a bankruptcy auction last year, it said.

Roxio would pay 30 million dollars in cash and stock for the subscriber-based service, started three years ago as a legal alternative to Napster and similar services.

Pressplay charges a monthly fee of about ten dollars for access to an online music library, and has about 50,000 subscribers, the 'Times' said.

Millions of people are still swapping music files online for free, using services like Morpheus and Grokster that sprang up after the demise of Napster.

In April a judge ruled that owners of those services cannot be held liable for copyright infringement because -- unlike Napster -- they do not use their own computers to store the files.

Bureau Report