Bono reckons that over the next decade it will be the movie industry who will finally put an end to illegal downloading, in the US at least, as easier access to higher bandwidth and larger disk drives makes it far more viable to get films off the net for free. Once this becomes as widespread as downloading music, says the U2 frontman, studio bosses will wade right in and stamp the whole thing right out.

And you know what? He might (sorry, I just need a moment before I type these words in relation to some Bono said) be right. Luckily, he's said some other stuff that makes him sound like an arse.

Writing in his New York Times column, Bono said: "The only thing protecting the movie and TV industries from the fate that has befallen music and indeed the newspaper business is the size of the files. The immutable laws of bandwidth tell us we're just a few years away from being able to download an entire season of '24' in 24 seconds. Many will expect to get it free".

This fact, he reckons, could be what causes the tide to turn. He continues: "Perhaps movie moguls will succeed where musicians and their moguls have failed so far, and rally America to defend the most creative economy in the world, where music, film, TV and video games help to account for nearly four percent of gross domestic product".

Of course, it's not like Bono is some sort of visionary on this subject. First the movie industry has already stepped up its anti-file-sharing efforts, and is widely expected to become increasingly proactive in this domain. And second, while the movie industry might have more money and better connections than the music business, some doubt they'll be able really stop clever kids from employing new technology to hide their file-sharing. Still, they might be able to rally more political support for three-strikes style file-sharer disconnection systems that put more onus on the internet service providers in the anti-piracy battle.  

And it's the ISPs that Bono reckons are to blame for the file-sharing problem. In fact, he goes so far as to claim that the service providers' "swollen profits perfectly mirror the lost receipts of the music business". I'm not sure "perfectly" is quite the word, but I'd be quite happy to take a look over the stats Bono is using the back that up.

He also adds that "we know from America's noble effort to stop child pornography, not to mention China's ignoble effort to suppress online dissent, that it's perfectly possible to track content". And there's that 'perfect' word again. As we say, there is much debate over how easy it is to actually track the sharing of illegal music content - given the development of new technology to hide the sharing - and tracking piracy certainly isn't the same as tracking down porn sites and blog posts. But whatever.

Bono finishes up by referring to himself as an "over-rewarded rock star" in that way I'm sure he thinks makes him look selfless and humble, but just makes him sound smug. Oh, Bono.