Music From The Heavens - For A Fee

Judg3 writes: "There's an article over at Wired about how Sirius Radio [Warning: features rude Java - timothy] just launched the first of three satellites that plan to provide coast-to-coast digital radio to the tune (heh) of only 9.95$/month. Why pay for their digital radio when we have the free analog stuff? Well, according to Sirius, and their competitors XM Satellite Radio, people will pay the extra dough for the niche channels out there, somewhat like Cable TV these days. I dont know about you, but I'm looking forward to the '80s Glam-Rock Channel' and the 'Who 24/7 Channel'" I see this relegated to supplying soothing in-store Muzak(tm)-type background music -- won't free and micropayment-driven Internet delivery make this redundant for ordinary listeners? Still, I'd like to see a political-satire channel, or a stand-up comic channel, or a lot of other obscurities.

An unnamed correspondent adds: "Stereophile reports:'The Sirius 1, built by Space Systems/Loral, will be placed in an inclined elliptical orbit with high angles of elevation to the ground. The company says this type of orbit will improve reception in urban areas.'" Just as interesting, the article mentions a tabletop radio manufactured by Thomson, to be branded in the U.S. as RCA: "The AM/FM/IM (Internet Modulation) radio connects through an Ethernet connection on the tabletop product, allowing listeners to find thousands of different channels of entertainment." Nice to see Stereophile enter the MP3 age intact, too.

Comments

For those without Flash...

[pingouin]

...click here. All I got was a pretty blue screen when I accessed the Flashful home page.

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Oooooh, a press release. DMX + Music Choice exist

[hatless]

So there's another company trying to compete with DMX, MusicChoice, Muzak and SkyRadio. Their one hook is that they're trying to be the first to get portable and mobile receivers made, which will go thr way of the dodo, quadraphonics, 8-track and AM stereo if the receivers are designed only to hook to their system.

Satellite and cable narrowcast "radio" stations have been around for some years now. And yes, while DMX and Sky are available to digital cable and home sattelite customers at home, their core revenue source is commercial subscribers: shops, restaurants, offices, buildings and so forth, which pay a higher fee.

There's certainly a niche for this sort of thing for mobile delivery. But it's going to be short-lived. Once wireless broadband rolls out in larger metropolitan areas in a couple of years, you'll be able to listen to your favorite high-bandwidth streaming audio services--or even access the MP3 jukebox you have at home, for that matter. Of course, there will have to be a way to make up for the lost visual ad revenue for some streaming stations, but that will probably come from ISPs paying a blanket charge covering all of their subscribers, just as cable and satellite TV companies pay fees to providers of the "basic cable" channels.

Re:Who really needs digital radio?

[spudnic]

I can't believe this attitude. I've been following this for quite some time and personally can't wait for it to happen.

Yeah yeah, I've got tons of mp3's burned on cd to handle most of my music cravings, but this is so much more.

I spend a LOT of time in my car, often times driving in rural areas where reception is shotty at best. The idea of being able to pick up NPR at anytime, anywhere I am is great!

They're working with the Sci-Fi channel for doing original programming... and old-time radio shows... news... and great late night talk shows so that I won't have to change channels every 15 minutes driving down the interstate to keep listening to "Dreamland".

Will I listen to it at home? No, probably not. They understand this. That's why they are targeting users in their car!

Will I pay $9.95 a month for this? I can't wait to.