Sirius, XM Merger Gets FCC Approval

Multiple readers, including koavf, have written to tell us the FCC has finally approved the Sirius-XM merger that has been in the works for quite a while now. CNN has picked up AP coverage as well. We discussed approval of the merger by the Justice Department a few months ago. From CNN: "The Federal Communications Commission voted 3-2 to approve the buyout, with the tiebreaker coming Friday night from Republican commissioner Deborah Taylor Tate. Tate had insisted that the companies settle charges that they violated FCC rules before she would approve the deal. The companies agreed this week to pay $19.7 million to the U.S. Treasury for violations related to radio receivers and ground-based signal repeaters. FCC Chairman Kevin Martin confirmed the final vote Friday night. 'I think it's going to be, in the end, a good thing for consumers and be in the public interest,' he told The Associated Press."

Comments

Business as usual

[Chester K]

Of course, the merger comes with strict conditions to keep things in the public interest.

Conditions like the conditions XM and Sirius were originally given when they were granted space on the spectrum. Conditions such as "these two companies may never, ever be allowed to merge".

Re:Business as usual

[TooMuchToDo]

If the companies can't survive without each other, what's the harm in letting them merge? It's not like they're going to lock you out of terrestrial radio. Times change. Just because before we said "You may never merge" doesn't mean it should apply today.

Re:Business as usual

[Shihar]

Yeah? And Ford has a monopoly on cars made by Ford. w00t. Someone call the lawyers.

All companies are monopolies if you narrow the 'slice' of what you are looking at down far enough. You need to look at the big picture though. Sure, Sirius and XM have a monopoly on satellite radio, but satellite radio sure as hell doesn't have a monopoly on ears. I happily listen to an MP3 player or free radio on my way into work without feeling the slightest pressure to go dump however much it costs for bad satellite radio.

Monopolies only work when there are no or few other viable option. If there is a simple substitution, the monopoly is broken, even if it isn't exactly the same product. It is like if Apple all of a sudden started to charge even higher prices for that silly little MP3 players. You couldn't cry foul over their "monopoly" on iPods. Sure, iPods might not be available at a reasonable price, but a smart person would just pick up another MP3 player that is cheaper.

The reason why they two are being allowed to merge is because one is going to tank if they don't merge. One is going to tank because satellite radio is getting murdered by the competition. If one is going to go bust, it is better to let them do it in a less destructive manner. It would be one thing if satellite radio was dominating and people were clawing at each other to break into the market. That isn't the case though, satellite radio is just barely hanging on. Letting the two companies merge is far more likely to result in quality improvements and price drops as they consolidate their infrastructure and struggle to compete in the less than profitable radio market.

Re:Business as usual

[Chester K]

If the companies can't survive without each other, what's the harm in letting them merge?

The companies might have a valid case about 'not being able to survive without each other' if they didn't make almost suicidally bad business decisions like paying Howard Stern 300 million dollars only to find out he can't bring in enough subscribers to even break even on his paycheck.

And if they were to have failed individually, I'm sure there are plenty of buyers who'd love to have gotten their assets and put together a profitable satellite radio company with their current subscriber numbers.

Instead they got what amounts to a bailout -- except instead of dollars, the currency of their bailout is fair competition to the benefit of consumers in a market that's now effectively being made into a government approved, privately maintained monopoly

Re:Business as usual

[loraksus]

Oh please. Their struggles are about as legitimate as Microsoft's whining that there aren't enough H1B visas being handed out and that there are no qualified Americans for X thousand jobs.

Re:Business as usual

[afidel]

meh, the Stern deal was probably worth it for the publicity alone, think about it, you and millions of others still remember it years later.

Re:Business as usual

[mazarin5]

Although if you widen the slice enough, nothing is a monopoly. Microsoft is not a monopoly, because you can always buy a Mac, or a typewriter, or a toaster. :)

They have monopolized the satellite radio market, but not the greater radio market in general - that's still Clear Channel's domain.

Re:Business as usual

[Anonymous Coward]

By that logic, it would be okay if Ford were the only company making cars, because cars aren't the only form of transport, right? Dell is the only company making computers? So what, you can go to a library!

Re:Business as usual

[Saint Stephen]

I never would have bought Sirius if it wasn't for Stern.

Re:Business as usual

[mrsteveman1]

Monopolies are relevant for discussion within a market, and satellite radio is a market distinct from other audio formats, so yes this is a 100% monopoly. Simply because buyers can find other things to listen to doesn't mean this isn't a monopoly or that the impact on consumers won't matter if they merge. Your argument amounts to "no one really wants this market anyway so why don't we let one company have the entire thing, you won't even notice, you can still buy iPods!"

Re:Business as usual

[rudy_wayne]

"Just because before we said "You may never merge" doesn't mean it should apply today."

You have a very strange understanding of the word "never".

Re:Business as usual

[xanadu-xtroot.com]

Before Howard signed, Sirius had only about 500,000 subscribers. Only 2.5 years after Howard broadcasting, they are over 8 million.
Before Howard signed, Sirius was about to fold up shop because XM was creaming them in subscribers. Now, Sirius is spearheading the merger with XM being the "loser" of the two.

I'd say the He/She that owns Sirius (with Mel's help, of course) made a damn good business decision with signing Howard.



Yes, I am a Stern fan. I've been a listener since '90 +/-.

Re:Business as usual

[strabes]

If the companies can't survive without each other, what's the harm in letting them merge?

There's little harm because nobody I know even uses satellite radio anymore. Direct iPod/mp3 player connection is far better.

Re:Business as usual

[WhatAmIDoingHere]

Knowing about a dumb deal and subscribing to Sirius satellite radio are two different things.

Re:Business as usual

[WhatAmIDoingHere]

Maybe it's you who has the strange understanding of the word. People use the word 'never' all the time, but they don't actually MEAN "not ever." What they most likely mean is "not in the foreseeable future."

Re:Business as usual

[Anonymous Coward]

I never would buy Sirius because of Stern, and now I will never buy Satellite radio because of Stern.

Re:Business as usual

[Shihar]

You miss the point entirely. Honda has a monopoly on Honda Civics. Only Honda is allowed to make a Civic by law. Despite this, we don't consider Honda a monopoly, simply because there are lots of other cars by other companies that we consider "civic like" such that you can easily find an alternative. If Honda was to double the price of a Civic tomorrow, you would just by a different car and feel only mildly annoyed.

On the other hand, if Honda was the only one allowed to build cars in general, we would call them a monopoly. Many people need a car and have no real alternative to a car. Sure, airplanes, trains, and buses compete with cars, but they compete poorly in many instances. Only a car is going to drive you 25 miles through a New England winter from one small town to another.

The Sirius and XM merger is not a big deal for two reasons.

1) There are lots of alternatives. If the price of cars doubled, many people would simply shell out double the cash to get one. If the price of XM/Sirius doubles without a quality improvement that people find fair, they will simply stop using the service. Free AM/FM radio are direct competitors with satellite radio. MP3 players are also direct competition for satellite radio. I can't substitute riding the bus for buy a car in many instances, but it is pretty trivial to substitute an iPod for satellite radio.

2) There is going to be only one satellite company, like it or not. Neither Sirius or XM are profitable. One of them WILL go bankrupt in the next couple of years. Once that happens you will be left with... one satellite radio station. They are begging to be allowed to merge because they want the destruction of the companies to be productive, rather then have one scattered to the wind while the other scrambles to pick up the pieces.

Like it or not, there will be only one satellite radio station. The only question is if it is going to happen in a couple of years when one finally throws in the towel, or because they merged and combined programing in an attempt to better compete with AM/FM and MP3 players.

Re:Business as usual

[WhatAmIDoingHere]

Indeed, I only use my XM when I'm at home and want to listen to some new music. When driving, I use my iPhone hooked up to my car's Aux Input.

What gets me, is that it was cheaper to get the iPhone than to get the XM radio installed in my "XM READY" car. $630 for the XM antenna and decoder card vs $199 for my iPhone.

Re:Business as usual

[Lincolnshire Poacher]

>Free AM/FM radio are direct competitors with satellite radio. MP3 players are also direct competition for satellite radio.

Bear with me, as a UKian talking about the US market. Would it also be acceptable for there to be a single cable TV station and a single over-the-air TV station? After all, DVDs and camcorder recordings are direct competitors for peoples' eyeballs if they wish to spend time staring at their plasma screen.

If a person in the US has a satellite radio receiver, there will be only one station to receive. If someone has a cable receiver, should there also not only be a single station? All those TV stations competing with each other is awfully wasteful.

Re:Business as usual

[i41Overlord]

It's not like those terms were agreed upon 50 or 100 years ago, it was agreed upon not too long ago. What is the point of having laws/agreements/contracts if the parties can randomly decide that the terms are no longer valid?

Re:Business as usual

[Anonymous Coward]

I cut off my ears and poked out my eyes because of Stern. If reality will host such filth I don't want any part in it!

Re:Business as usual

[nawcom]

Heh, please someone explain the filth that his show supposedly has... I've heard more offensive material than what he has. Is it the pro-homosexuality aspect of the show (George Takei) or is it the open opinions of the show? Controversial interviews? Sick humor (get over it, nerds love sick humor, and if you are grossed out by it then you're on the wrong website). Maybe it's the occasional use the the *quiets* ... f-word used as an adjective... No no no... it's the pro-choice aspect of it. Or is it because he loves to make fun of a certain KKK member? Noooo... no one makes fun of the KKK. Oh wait.. he degrades women... yeahhh... give me a fucking break. With all the female listeners who love the show, the last thing he does is degrade females. If some porn star wants to come on the show, the first thing you would expect is for her to get nude. (What's funny is the same people who beat off to porn find this offensive.) The worst he does is point out the stupidity in porn stars. He's had an African American female co-anchor since the early 80s in DC101. Oh I know why you are disgusted with the filth... because every one who has never heard his show makes negative assumptions. That's the real reason.

Re:Business as usual

[lawpoop]

The companies might have a valid case about 'not being able to survive without each other' if they didn't make almost suicidally bad business decisions like paying Howard Stern 300 million dollars only to find out he can't bring in enough subscribers to even break even on his paycheck.

What are you talking about? The big talking point when the new broke that Sirius had signed Stern was that "Oh, Stern has to bring in one million subscribers for them to break even."

Sirius gained 1 million subscribers, going from 1 million to 2 million subscribers, in the year between the time Stern signed and the show started broadcasting. 2.5 years later, they are over 8 million subscribers.

So, to recap -- Sirius had 1.1 million subscribers on Dec. 31st, 2004. They are now over 8 million. Could they have done that without Stern? No. Without Stern, they would be out of business. Stern has paid off in spades. Well worth the investment.

Re:Business as usual

[Shihar]

I think that you could make a pretty solid argument that a single cable operator would be a approaching a monopoly in its area. The reason why this would be is that cable has extremely high infiltration (at least in the US). It is almost viewed as "needed" with minimal alternatives That said, there are many spots in the US where there really only is one cable company. In my area, I have two to pick from. I have chosen to use neither exactly because I think it is a rip off. My world hasn't ended.

In the case of Sirius/XM they own a very small hunk of the market. It would be one thing if nearly every single person had a satellite receiver in their car, like the way nearly everyone has a cable box, and the companies wanted to merge. That simply isn't the case. Satellite radio has a small penetration to the market, both companies are hemorrhaging money as they get kicked around by the competition, and pretty much everyone agrees that one of the companies will go bankrupt in the next couple of years unless action is taken.

There will be one satellite radio provider no matter what is done. Satellite radio is facing an end game. The companies are on the verge of collapse, and once one collapses they are going to go to the FCC anyways to get a thumbs up to try and sweep up the pieces. They are just preempting the inevitable.

I wouldn't be against reexamining the issue if satellite one day took up a huge amount of the market share... but they aren't. They are small boats in a big sea trying desperately to stay afloat. They make no profit and have a small customer base. There is no monopoly here, just two companies looking to cooperate instead of dragging each other down into bankruptcy.

Re:Business as usual

[mrsteveman1]

I love when children get on Slashdot. Thanks so much for that.

Re:Business as usual

[mrsteveman1]

iPods are non-live content devices, and a good amount of the content available on satellite radio is likely not available for download freely anyway. So as a content delivery model they couldn't be more different.

In other words, you expand the definition of alternative that wide and anything that makes sound counts.

I don't care if they are profitable or not, if no one really wants satellite radio service it should die. Simply joining 2 failed companies isn't going to magically make people want the service.

Re:Business as usual

[Shihar]

No they are not the same, but they compete for roughly the same thing: ears in the car. Like I said, it would be one thing if satellite radio had a huge market penetration. It doesn't. It is relatively rare, unprofitable, and in general getting trashed by the alternatives. So, if we have a small and unpopular service getting ruined by the competition, why exactly would you seek to keep companies from merging in a desperate attempt to stay afloat?

They know, and everyone agrees, that their niche is so small that two companies can't survive it. They have already thrown up their hands in surrender and now want to cooperate in an attempt to form some entity that can carry on and compete with the alternatives that are trashing them. By joining the two companies they can cobble together a better product, slash some redundant infrastructure, and hopefully make something that is profitable.

The point of monopoly rules isn't to see how many companies you can sink while government regulators laugh with malevolent glee. The point is to keep the consumer from getting the shaft when a single player dominates a large market. The point of monopoly regulations is to make it such that monopolies can't charge massively outrageous prices while cutting off all the viable alternatives. Satellite radio isn't dominating any market, and consumers are not getting the shafted. In fact, Satellite radio is charging consumers LESS than it costs to run their operation because they are so desperate to get a few more ears and break into a market utterly dominated by other alternatives.

The government is rightfully stepping out of the way. If the two companies merge and satellite radio still is unprofitable, the company will sink and that will be the end. If they don't merge, one of the companies will sink, and you will still be left with just a single player in the market. Maybe though, through the action of the government getting out of the way and not regulating this dying market to death, they can cobble together a new company that at least has the capacity to compete with the alternatives that are currently kicking their ass.

If 10 years from now everyone ones a satellite radio and terrestrial radio is getting pwned, maybe it will be time to look at how to kill the monopoly and open it up for competition. Until then, absolutely nothing is served by keeping these two companies apart. Consumer will get the shaft if one of the companies dies a painful bankrupt death, and it is pretty clear that competition is so harsh right now that merging into a single company is very unlikely to result in anything bad for current consumers. Other than some twisted malevolent glee at watching already struggling companies get regulated to death, there is no reason to NOT let them merge.

Re:Business as usual

[Anonymous Coward]

The Stern deal paid for itself in subscribers within 4 months. In publicity it was invaluable.

Re:Business as usual

[chad.koehler]

Prior to Stern going to Sirius they had about 700K subscribers. They now have close to 9 million. While you cannot say that ALL of the new subscribers (over 8 million of them) came strictly for Stern, it is highly suspect since XM's subscriber base did not grow anywhere near the same proportion. I think a lot of people don't realize the effect that "dumb deal" had.

Re:Business as usual

[Anonymous Coward]

No need to draw comparisons. If satellite is unattractive to you, be it because of price or whatever, you are free to not buy it. Simple.
You have lots of other options.
No one is forcing you to get satellite radio.
Personally, I don't get satellite, because, like cable, the content doesn't justify the price, in my opinion. I can spend that money on CDs and DVDs and watch and listen to what I want, when I want it on my iPod, my PDA, in my car or on my computer.
Total freedom of choice.
There have been times that I have been tempted, but it is usually just a passing attraction.

America is a free market, and it should remain so. This is capitalism.
Make a compeling product at the right price, and the market will follow.

Re:Business as usual

[Anonymous Coward]

I forgot to mention, I also don't listen to terrestrial radio, except for public radio, which I contribute to.
Terrestrial radio, which used to be called commercial radio, for good reason,is mostly garbage.
I pay for what I like, filter out the rest.
If terrestrial (free) radio is afraid of losing listeners to a PAID service, what does it say about the quality of their product?

It is all about freedom of choice. and yes, you have choice. let's keep it that way.

Re:Business as usual

[elyjr1]

I am one of those millions who bought Sirius just for Howard. I got the lifetime membership and was well worth it. Sirius already made back the money they paid for Howard and his archives they bought for him. I'm very happy this merger finally went through and will be getting even more channels. Somone also posted they didn't know which service has no commercial on the music stations and it is Sirius. There are commercials on the talk, news, and misc entertainment sites.

I think it's a good thing.

[Anonymous Coward]

Wait, the FCC did something good?

WTF???

[Jane Q. Public]

How could a single, monopolistic provider of a service, nationwide, be "a good thing for consumers and be in the public interest" ????

Has Orwellian doublespeak progressed so far??

Re:WTF???

[Cylix]

Weren't their numbers in the toilet anyway?

I never really had a desire to pick it up and I wasn't impressed with any of my friends purchases.

I'm sure some people like the 24/7 larry the cable guy channel.

Now, I did consider XM when they had the PC interface, but that died with the product.

Re:WTF???

[Giometrix]

How could a single, monopolistic provider of a service, nationwide, be "a good thing for consumers and be in the public interest" ????

Has Orwellian doublespeak progressed so far??

Because Satellite Radio is not a monopoly; it is competing against FREE terrestrial radio, mp3 players, ipods, FREE internet radio, etc.

Re:WTF???

[jt2377]

HD Radio is here. It's not like XM-Siruis doesn't have to fight the free radio. It's radio after all. 90% of people probably buy HD radio and listen for free compare to paying monthly subscription.

Re:WTF???

[Bill, Shooter of Bul]

Its good because they were both unprofitable. Hopefully after the merger they will be able to be solvent. Satellite radio is awesome, whether anyone realizes it or not. There is NO CENSORSHIP WHAT-SO-EVER. I'd repeat some of the things said here, but I think my ISP would object. The company suits do not make music selections, unlike any other radio station on earth. No static, unlimited range, an entire channel dedicated to the grateful dead. Chill, house, ambient, thrash metal, punk, bluegrass, three types of jazz all at your finger tips, and even if you hate music they have a top 40 station, a brittish top 40 station, and a couple Canadian channels.

Re:WTF???

[Garridan]

Good idea. Take two companies that can't pay the bills, and put them together. After a merger, all the suits stay, and they can half of the rest of the employees because they're redundant. So you get one company with twice the fat... and they'll be able to pay the bills *better* than the old companies?

Re:WTF???

[jevvim]

Unlimited range? Try driving through West Virginia with satellite radio; you'll discover that mountains & trees are NOT friends with the service.

Re:WTF???

[ya really]

No one seems to complain on here that much about the National Retirement Fund, the post office (though Canada's partial privitization of it has had lackluster results) or spoke out against the possibility of nationalized of health care in the US (by no means an endorsement by me of the job insurance companies do now). If one is going to critique monopolies, they have to look at both the private and public sector though. After all, slashdot of all places should know that just because something is solely in the hands of the "public" does not mean it has much more of an interest in the public than a private corporation.

Re:WTF???

[dougisfunny]

Its probably still better than the Terrestrial radio I recall from the last time I went through the area.

Re:WTF???

[Anonymous Coward]

The Post Office does its job, and it does it well. It's certainly not the fastest, but your mail gets from point A to point B in a reasonable amount of time. That's why nobody complains about it.

If only all government agencies would be like that.

Re:WTF???

[Giometrix]

Good idea. Take two companies that can't pay the bills, and put them together. After a merger, all the suits stay, and they can half of the rest of the employees because they're redundant. So you get one company with twice the fat... and they'll be able to pay the bills *better* than the old companies?

While in some ways there will be fat; now they won't be competing (or killing) each other paying for talent and licensing fees... $500m for Stern, $300m for Oprah, something similar for baseball, etc.

These people and services were playing the two companies against each other.... now they can't do that.

Re:WTF???

[Vancorps]

What do you mean it died? You can stream XM over the Internet and it even works on Linux with firefox assuming you have the wmp plugin of course.

I'm definitely a fan of XM, I like driving half way across the country without having to fiddle with the radio stations, it just works everywhere I go and no static.

XM has a lot of channels though with something for pretty much everyone. I hate sounding like a commercial for them but they really do blow terrestrial radio out of the water. For me these days it's XM and Pandora for 90% of my music listening time.

Re:WTF???

[Ihmhi]

I'd care about sat radio if they carried one of the most awesome stations in the country, 89.5 FM WSOU. Seton Hall Pirate Radio, winner of numerous awards, and some of the best DJs around for rock music.

It's the only station where you can hear Metallica played back to back with something newer like A Perfect Circle or Machine Head.

And on Sundays, Polka music!

Re:WTF???

[Isotopian]

They couldn't pay the bills because they spent so much money sniping at each other. With their literal competition now gone, they can focus on the competition that matters - the terrestrial radio stations.

Re:WTF???

[timmarhy]

"Good idea. Take two companies that can't pay the bills, and put them together. After a merger, all the suits stay, and they can half of the rest of the employees because they're redundant. So you get one company with twice the fat... and they'll be able to pay the bills *better* than the old companies?"

totally wrong. typically in mergers middle management gets cleaned out (because they are useless yet don't have enough clout in the company to hold onto their jobs) and board memembers take a golden parachute. your average employee if they are smart will reframe it as an opertunity and try jump into a promotion during the restructure.

i'm guess that's not you though....

Re:WTF???

[giminy]

Because Satellite Radio is not a monopoly; it is competing against FREE terrestrial radio, mp3 players, ipods, FREE internet radio, etc.

That's kind of like saying that Internet access is competing against FREE bulletin board systems. We saw how well BBSes fared through the early to mid 90s...

I dunno if maybe this just means that it's terrestrial radio's time to exit stage right. Maybe it is? It brings a little bit of sadness to my eyes though...hopefully nobody can fault me for that. And jeez, I'm talking like this and I'm not even thirty years old...

My trouble is, I guess, that we (you and I) own the radio spectrum [assuming that you are a US citizen ;-)]. The FCC should only give people access to this shared resource if those people are willing to play by a few ground rules. One of those ground rules should be healthy competition, e.g. the FCC should grant at least two companies access to the medium and spectrum in question, so that customers [not 'consumers', because I hate that word] deserve a choice. I worry if only one company will now have the ability to access this nifty service on our public airwaves...because while they may be competing with other services, it doesn't have the look and feel that they are competing on a level playing field. I certainly can't listen to terrestrial radio, mp3 players, ipods, nor internet radio under the same conditions that I can listen to satellite radio.

Re:WTF???

[Anonymous Coward]

I think the point is that with essentially no competition, they'll be able to better control your experience. "fair and balanced"? you ain't seen nothing yet. As an aside, I've been considering buying a new car with the vendor-provided GPS service, but as I have comee to realize that's essentially a subscription to satellite radio, I'm less and less enthusiastic.

Re:WTF???

[purpledinoz]

I think this IS in the public interest. With a unified service, you don't have to choose between the NHL, NFL, NBA, MLB, etc, since they will all be on one service. Also, it's not a monopoly. It's competing against regular free (and shitty) radio. Think about it. After they merge, they can't just charge more money and reduce service. People will just cancel and listen to regular radio or their own music players. That's their competition. The biggest opposition against the merger was the National Association of Broadcasters (NAB), which represents regular radio. Isn't it strange that the competition was against the merger? I think that's a good indication that this was a good move.

Re:WTF???

[LiquidHAL]

A single satellite radio company is not really a "single, monopolistic provider of a service, nationwide" though. It's a direct competitor of traditional radio. It also competes with mp3 players and podcasts, CD's, audio books, etc. If they started any sort of monopolistic practices, people can just cancel their subscriptions and choose a multitude of other audio distribution methods. The justice department spent over a year investigating the issue and ruled that it would not in fact be a monopoly.

The two companies have lost hundreds of millions of dollars last year. At this point it may not be a question of two satellite radio companies or one, it's one company or none. And the "approval" is not a straight approval, it would require them to set aside a quarter of their bandwidth for their direct competitors. Which brings up an interesting point. Who has forced this issue to be delayed through various government agencies over the last two years? The National Association of Broadcasters. Not some consumer interest group, but an organization representing some of the largest companies in the country, who will be hurting most from this decision. Not because it's creating a monopoly, but because it has the potential to break the attempted (and FCC approved) monopolies of its clients in regional markets.

Re:WTF???

[ya really]

Actually, there is a fairly legit criticism of the US post office that would probably have some support on slashdot if it were more widely known. Until 1912, mail was delivered on Sundays in the United States. However, religious leaders felt that it was hurting their attendence (and subsequently, their collection plates) and appealed to the government to stop delivery on Sunday. Post offices at that time doubled as public gathering places to socialize. Supporters of no-Sunday delivery still claim that the post office is closed to prevent a government subsidized agency from forcing Christians to work on Sunday, a protection of religious freedom. That however is obvious bullshit, since the post office does not close for any other religion. Even using that reasoning, it's a clear violation of the seperation of church and state.

For more details search google or check out this article.

Re:WTF???

[rock56501]

unlimited range

Unfortunately, I cannot listen to Sirius here in Hawaii. I had Sirius built in to my car when I lived on the mainland, but the only way to listen to it here in Hawaii is via the internet and I'm not going to pay for the internet.

Hopefully, in the future, they will get a satellite over the islands so that we can get a signal.

Re:WTF???

[mccabem]

"FREE"....I don't think that word means what you think it means. ;-) $15/month is closer to free than what you're talking about. You're just not considering the real costs aside from simply monetary.

FWIW, I'm anti-merger on principal. If the satellite companies aren't making money, they have a few options in my book: Charge their customer's enough to make money; Increase their number of customers so they make money; Go non-profit so making money isn't the target. For crap's sake, their competition has hardly changed since they came out with their product - radio and TV aren't getting any "more free" after all and my internet bill has yet to go down. Did these fools even have a business plan??

I also have a hard time believing that satellite broadcasting can be cost efficient for entertainment at all - in terms of being a good business investment. They have and will continue to spend in-siz-nane amounts of money on satellites and the respective maintenance. Considering the massive floor that puts into their cost structure I don't see how they can ever fully compete with ground-based services.

To me higher prices are inevitable - in dollars from their subscribers, more advertising, or maybe more welfare from the government or their peers (GM, Hughes, et al) since they've been unusually good at that. If the business model is as bad as it seems from the industry's performance they should have been allowed to fail before they expended resources to start flying more satellites. Someone else likely could have put the resources to better use. I suppose that may still be true.

Last, from TFA: "The companies said they would introduce radios that receive both XM and Sirius channels." If memory serves, they said the same 10+ years ago. Can someone tell me why companies are allowed (seemingly encouraged) so often to act like petulant 5 year olds?

Sorry for being wordy. :)

-Matt

P.S. Can't resist one more word on their costs. The company that makes their satellites (SS/L) claims in their literature they have 48 of the satellites XM and Sirius use in orbit and separately that their satellites have 1100 years of successful on-orbit time. Assuming they've done their unleveled best to use the numbers to make themselves look good, that gives their satellites a top estimated average lifespan of only 20 years, probably less. Correct me if I'm wrong, but translated that means in at most another 10 years, SeriousExcem is already going to have to start replacing these satellites. Of course, none of the existing satellites will have a problem in the mean time.

Re:WTF???

[servognome]

I'd guess no deliveries on Sunday is a cost savings move.

Re:WTF???

[servognome]

Typically in mergers half the suits leave, the politically weak get forced out or some see it as their chance to cash out and move on. What you'll end up with is a slightly larger company with many more customers, that's how you get profitability.

Re:WTF???

[servognome]

Internet industries (pretty much any business model) of the late 90's needed to shed excessive competition to provide a workable long term service and the consolidation of retail has led to business models which are able to deliver better service to customers.

Re:WTF???

[Enry]

I think the reference was to the USB dongle that would pick up XM signals directly and play them on your computer.

Re:WTF???

[Enry]

I certainly can't listen to terrestrial radio, mp3 players, ipods, nor internet radio under the same conditions that I can listen to satellite radio.

Sorry, I can't parse that. Do you mind explaining what you mean?

Re:WTF???

[Enry]

For crap's sake, their competition has hardly changed since they came out with their product - radio and TV aren't getting any "more free" after all and my internet bill has yet to go down.

Aside from the arrival of HD Radio, the explosion of ipods and MP3 players, and Internet Radio, you're right.

Last, from TFA: "The companies said they would introduce radios that receive both XM and Sirius channels." If memory serves, they said the same 10+ years ago. Can someone tell me why companies are allowed (seemingly encouraged) so often to act like petulant 5 year olds?

Given neither Sirus nor XM were broadcasting until 7-8 years ago, I'm not sure how you could have heard that, or thought they would make compatible radios.

Correct me if I'm wrong, but translated that means in at most another 10 years, SeriousExcem is already going to have to start replacing these satellites. Of course, none of the existing satellites will have a problem in the mean time.

That's why at least XM and I think Sirius have launched new satellites recently, and yea, the life expectancy is about 20 years. So what?

Re:WTF???

[TallMatthew]

For months, I believed that satellite radio could not be considered a monopoly, for the reason cited above: namely, that it competes with terrestial radio and the like.

However, were this true, what would keep DirecTV from merging with Dish Network? It's an identical situation. I can tell you, after having to badger DirecTV for months to receive a promised refund (including filing through a chapter of the BBB which has been overwhelmed with DirecTV complaints), that competition is oftentimes preferable.

Re:WTF???

[Thyamine]

No censorship? Perhaps you are referring to some of the channels that host Howard Stern and such, but all of the music channels I listen to on XM still bleep out lyrics.

Re:WTF???

[maxume]

Yeah, I don't think they have the pricing power for the merger to be worrisome. A lot of people don't think they are even worth $12 a month, so they aren't exactly go to attract a bunch of customers by increasing the prices.

Re:WTF???

[barzok]

You can thank ClearChannel's involvement in XM for that.

Sirius does not censor music lyrics or anything else on ANY of their channels.

Re:WTF???

[Anonymous Coward]

nope, infact HD radio uptake is rather low. XM & Sirius blow the HD out of the water. HD is still limited to the tower, commercials, and no real special programming. XM & Sirius on the other hand are uncensored, cover a lot more area (you can drive from NY to LA without changing the channel), and at least in my market sound a ton better than HD FM. The HD FM here sounds like a cheap internet stream.

And yes, I deal with this stuff on a daily basis

Re:WTF???

[Giometrix]

No censorship? Perhaps you are referring to some of the channels that host Howard Stern and such, but all of the music channels I listen to on XM still bleep out lyrics.

Only on the non XL channels. I see nothing wrong with that.

Re:WTF???

[homer_s]

Another tell-tale sign that they wouldn't raise raters is that their competitors (terrestrial radio) are objecting to the merger.
Why would a competitor object to the merger if the new entity planned to raise rates and hence drive away customers? They object only because they know that the new entity will lower prices and attract new customers.

Re:WTF???

[Secrity]

I see a problem with censoring music lyrics on any channel, not just the XL channels.

Re:WTF???

[Verteiron]

I don't know about music, but there are USB dongles that allow you to pick up weather and radar data from XM. Here's one. Storm chasers love these.

Re:WTF???

[goaliemn]

Clear channel had a very small involvement in XM, and hasn't been involved now in years.. they sold their share ages ago..

XM offers "XL" channels with are "extreme language" so if you want censored lyrics, you can listen to some of the channels. For uncensored, there are the XL channels. XM also offers to block the XL channels on your radio, so it keeps mom and dad happy that JR can't hear those dirty words..

Re:WTF???

[Bill, Shooter of Bul]

Really? Sirius doesn't. Sometimes the DJ's self sensor themselves out of habit, then remember they're on satellite and launch into a barrage of fbombs for the heck of it. I'd go into more detail about the obscenities, but I fear comcast might read this and cut off my service.

Re:WTF???

[xs650]

You can get fairly good terrestrial radio coverage in mountain country from local stations. It may get fuzzy sounding occasionally, but it doesn't just plain drop out frequently like sat radio.

Banjo music gets tiresome though.

Re:WTF???

[Anonymous Coward]

Do you live in, perhaps, a nation that has a tax on public radio?

I, for one, have never paid for my terrestrial radio service.

My car came with XM, I'm not quite sure when the service will run out. They play a lot of "b side" type music, which is cool sometimes but not cool a lot of the time.

When it does expire, I'm debating whether its worth it to renew.

Re:WTF???

[eccenthink]

JERRY: (Excited) I can't believe I'm gonna be a mailman!
(Scene cuts to Jerry on Newman's route. He's walking along a city street with a mail cart. He stops infront of a store owner brooming the sidewalk)
JERRY: (Hands him some mail) There you go. Merry Chirstmas!
OWNER: Mail on Sunday?
JERRY: (Shrugs) Oops.

Re:WTF???

[FunkSoulBrother]

Wait what is my other option to get live out of market MLB games while I drive across the country?

Re:WTF???

[giminy]

Sorry, I can't parse that. Do you mind explaining what you mean?

The gp stated, 'Satellite Radio is not a monopoly; it is competing against FREE terrestrial radio, mp3 players, ipods, FREE internet radio, etc.'

I argue that satellite radio is a far different way of using our airwaves than terrestrial radio. Terrestrial radio is bound by ground-wave propagation -- I can't listen to Philadelphia's radio stations when I'm in my car driving in Seattle. I can listen to XM/Sirius wherever I am, though. The FCC limited terrestrial radio in this way by design. So satellite radio is not competing against free terrestrial radio. mp3 players and the like are also no comparison to the service that satellite radio offers, because they aren't broadcast (I can't get breaking news on my ipod). So satellite radio is not competing against mp3 player and ipods. And internet 'radio' doesn't exactly use radio waves, unless you count wifi. So satellite radio is not competing against internet 'radio.'

I argue that satellite radio really doesn't face competition from those mechanisms that the gp states -- satellite is a very very different kind of service. Since satellite radio is using a resource that I own (a chunk of the wireless spectrum), I would like for our government to ensure that the satellite radio company works in my best interest. Terrestrial commercial broadcasters, for example, are required to play public service announcements and news in exchange for the ability to use the airwaves.

The easiest and cheapest way of making this best-interest assurance is to require a competitor. If I don't think that XM/Sirius is working in my best interest, I could at least change carriers. I know, I know, it sounds horribly European. Sorry about that. Really, the other option to make sure that a satellite radio company provides unbiased public information services is to have constant and intense oversight of Sirius/XM by the FCC. In a sense, I'm really making the 'smaller' government argument here ;-).

Reid

Re:WTF???

[porkUpine]

While satellite has LIMITED censorship I would not go so far as to say it has NO censorship. O&A were suspended for a month a while back when one of their homeless guests went on a rant about raping Laura Bush... The bit was funny in a sick kind of way, but when O&A basically refused to apologize they were suspended... as punishment even re-runs of their show were not played. As a 5+ year subscriber to XM I was appalled. While the bit was tasteless and disturbing to some I did not expect this level of censorship on satellite radio. It's only going to get worse... Reverend Al will get a subscription and then all hell will break loose.

Re:WTF???

[MagusSlurpy]

Satellite radio is awesome, whether anyone realizes it or not. There is NO CENSORSHIP WHAT-SO-EVER.

That's not entirely true. There is self-imposed censorship. We listen to Sirius in my lab, and I have heard one of the channels (the top 40 channel, I think), censor "fuck" out of the crap-rock songs (Nickelpark, or Linkinback, or whatever the hell is popular this week).

I was really quite annoyed when I heard that, because I was under the impression that there was no censorship, either.

Re:WTF???

[ragefan]

I think the main difference is that there are lots of subscribers to DirecTV and Dish that have no alternative for TV programming, i.e live too far away from population centers to recieve cable services. But they can still receive multiple terrestrial radio stations.

Re:WTF???

[Anonymous Coward]

XM marks the channels that they don't censor as "XL" for eXplicit Language. They are channels:
41 "Boneyard"
42 "XM Liquid Metal"
48 "Squizz"
53 "Fungus"
65 "The Rhyme"
66 "RAW"
150 "XM Comedy"
153 "Laugh Attack"
202 "The Virus"

Re:WTF???

[Anonymous Coward]

Because Satellite Radio is not a monopoly; it is competing against FREE terrestrial radio, mp3 players, ipods, FREE internet radio, etc.

Since when is an ipod not a mp3 player?

Re:WTF???

[Bill, Shooter of Bul]

Ok, as I revealed in my previous statement I enjoy music, which is why I would never in a gabillion years listen to top 40. Its like a German taking a trip to St. Louis just to taste Budweiser.

Re:WTF???

[Enry]

The gp stated, 'Satellite Radio is not a monopoly; it is competing against FREE terrestrial radio, mp3 players, ipods, FREE internet radio, etc.'

This part is true.

I argue that satellite radio is a far different way of using our airwaves than terrestrial radio. Terrestrial radio is bound by ground-wave propagation -- I can't listen to Philadelphia's radio stations when I'm in my car driving in Seattle. I can listen to XM/Sirius wherever I am, though. The FCC limited terrestrial radio in this way by design. So satellite radio is not competing against free terrestrial radio.

Incorrect. Sorta. Take the example of any talk radio host, Dr. Demento, or NPR/PRI. They're providing the same show across the country. Aside from a few minutes of local news, All Things Considered is the same in Boston as it is in Miami. The FCC doesn't crack down on that. From a broadcasting standpoint, no one FM or AM station can transmit across the country, but there's no limiting propagating the content.

mp3 players and the like are also no comparison to the service that satellite radio offers, because they aren't broadcast (I can't get breaking news on my ipod). So satellite radio is not competing against mp3 player and ipods.

The iPhone can get breaking news and your e-mail. But the intent is really content since you can get breaking news via FM radio, which your car most likely already has. The iPod/mp3 player makes for full control over your content and many people are happy with that level of control.

And internet 'radio' doesn't exactly use radio waves, unless you count wifi.

Or if you get it over your cell phone (think iPhone again)

The easiest and cheapest way of making this best-interest assurance is to require a competitor. If I don't think that XM/Sirius is working in my best interest, I could at least change carriers. I know, I know, it sounds horribly European. Sorry about that. Really, the other option to make sure that a satellite radio company provides unbiased public information services is to have constant and intense oversight of Sirius/XM by the FCC. In a sense, I'm really making the 'smaller' government argument here ;-).

Actually, you're making a big government argument if you want the FCC to have such control over Sirius/XM. But anyway, portions of the spectrum will be set aside for minority programming, there are a variety of news stations (CNN, CNNHN, MSNBC, FNC, NPR, etc.) and a variety of talk radio stations. I think the spectrum is already being well represented on at least Sirius, and probably XM as well (I've been a Sirius subscriber for a number of years). If Sirius doesn't provide what I want, then I'll cancel the subs I have and go back to my iPod, internet radio, or plain 'ol FM.

Re:WTF???

[LiquidHAL]

It's the monopolistic anti-competitive practices of the MLB that you have to blame for this.

Re:WTF???

[nawcom]

lhmhi, you prove the point on why this is no monopoly. Aren't you worried about this merger? Why isn't this affecting the way you live compared to everyone else? Yeah, that's right, you have other things to listen to. I bet you that you could find channels on sat radio that give you what this station gives you, but the fact is that there is nothing making you get those channels. Hence, no monopoly at all.

Re:WTF???

[nawcom]

While satellite has LIMITED censorship I would not go so far as to say it has NO censorship. O&A were suspended for a month a while back when one of their homeless guests went on a rant about raping Laura Bush... The bit was funny in a sick kind of way, but when O&A basically refused to apologize they were suspended... as punishment even re-runs of their show were not played. As a 5+ year subscriber to XM I was appalled. While the bit was tasteless and disturbing to some I did not expect this level of censorship on satellite radio. It's only going to get worse... Reverend Al will get a subscription and then all hell will break loose.

Not trying to disagree with you at all, but I guess I would choose a different term than "censorship." There are still limits on extreme obscenity, and other things. You can't say you are out to shoot the President in the head. It doesn't matter where you are speaking at. I think the concept of raping the first lady is somewhat close to that. Can someone release some porno of a women who is dressed to be Laura Bush, hence is in the scene, where she is brutally facefucked? I think it won't matter how strict the release of it is dealt with, they will get a visit from the FBI (or equivalent). So that's why I don't think that it should be considered censorship, especially when it is protected under the government. If I misunderstood anything let me know.

Re:WTF???

[Anonymous Coward]

Who the hell is your provider? XM has channels that play edited songs, (most of the pop & decade stations do this, as well as one of the comedy stations).

Plus, I still get dropouts driving around in the LA metro area, and occasional bursts of static.

Don't get me wrong, I love having sat radio, but it's hardly the broadcast utopia you're describing. And when they join, it's unlikely the censorship is going to be dropped, since everyone has to use the same thing.

Re:WTF???

[Skater]

I actually just did that a couple weeks ago. It worked great!

I do get occasional dropouts from thick trees and whatever, but that's still far better than listening to FM commercials.

Re:WTF???

[Mr2001]

I believe Sirius only does that for one channel: "Sirius Hits 1", which you happened to be listening to.

Re:WTF???

[leviramsey]

There are a few Sirius channels that will play the radio edits of tracks. Most of the Pop channels are censored, for instance.

A pamphlet for the Sirius for Business from a few years ago listing the censored channels

Re:WTF???

[chad.koehler]

I'm NOT arguing that DirecTV and Dish merging would be bad, that almost assuredly would be....

However, in your case, did you switch? If NOT, how did the competition benefit YOU?

Re:WTF???

[mccabem]

Yes, including all those things, I do not consider that the market has changed significantly....and if it has, should that make us prefer merger more? I think not. The ipod phenom has nothing to do with the broadcast market, btw - it's an adjunct product, that's all. You're trying to say XM is competing with Apple. LOL.

Both companies (and their assets and libilities) did not start out as what they're known as today - both have origins and commitments dating to the late 80's. Get googling.

So what? So that was a feeble attempt to ignore the fact that satellites are f*****g expensive and have to be replaced with (to me) an alarming frequency. Fifteen years cited for the Hughes versions they use. That puts a huge floor in their cost structure compared to terrestrial broadcasters. Add to that the network of terrestrial stations they have to run in order to provide decent service and it's a deal breaker. I don't see how they can run without continued subsidies, higher fees, or more advertising - or maybe the consumer's trifecta: ALL THREE. And from the point of view of capital, I still don't see why entertainment satellite radio is happening at all.

I say it's a flawed business model and should be allowed to sink or swim on its own merits and capabilities - I don't see it as a public interest. (I.e. If GM & co want to keep infusing cash into the company for new satellites then I guess that's OK.)

-Matt

Re:WTF???

[Enry]

Of course, Sirius XM should be able to sink or swim on its own merits. I mean, aside from the restrictions that the FCC put on them (and the NAB demanded), oh, and the onerous fees that the RIAA put on their music but not on traditional broadcast radio.

But then again, where is the government actually helping Sirius XM aside from giving them the ability to pool resources (so they won't need to put up as many satellites)?

Re:WTF???

[Caped_Avenger]

Then you aren't listening to the right channels. First of all, Howard Stern is on Sirius, not XM and I personally can't stand the guy. Second of all, I know for a fact that Fungus 53 (Punk) and XMLM (XM Liquid Metal) are completely uncensored because I listen to them a lot. The channels are labeled with an XL for Explicit Lyrics. Check out the channel lineup on XM's website and you'll find many more XL channels.

Re:First Post

[teh moges]

See kids, this is why you shouldn't say "first post", even if you think you are...

Satellite Radio is a joke

[Anonymous Coward]

When I think of satellite radio, I think of this:
*Major genres unrepresented.
*Station playlists that would become predictable within a week.
*Sub-genres within all genres utterly unrepresented in general (for example, one Metal station on all of Sirius, and it only plays death metal).
*A whole slew of stations essentially devoted to playing the exact same stuff that you hear on standard Top 40 radio.
*Commercials, despite being advertised as commercial-free.
*Annoying DJs (the receivers display the name/artist playing, you do NOT need DJs trying to be funny between every song).
*Oh, and a monthly fee on top of that.

Frankly, satellite radio was created 10 years too late. Why should I put up with satellite radio when I can use my mp3 player?

Re:Satellite Radio is a joke

[Corpuscavernosa]

*Major genres unrepresented. *Station playlists that would become predictable within a week. *Sub-genres within all genres utterly unrepresented in general (for example, one Metal station on all of Sirius, and it only plays death metal). *A whole slew of stations essentially devoted to playing the exact same stuff that you hear on standard Top 40 radio. *Commercials, despite being advertised as commercial-free. *Annoying DJs (the receivers display the name/artist playing, you do NOT need DJs trying to be funny between every song). *Oh, and a monthly fee on top of that.

Unfortunately, consumer demand drives it. People listen to what's comfortable. I don't understand why the top40 stations are some of the most popular. Even the "indie" and punk stations play all the same crap. It's clearly selling though.

Re:Satellite Radio is a joke

[memiliesm]

Unfortunately, consumer demand drives it. People listen to what's comfortable. I don't understand why the top40 stations are some of the most popular. Even the "indie" and punk stations play all the same crap. It's clearly selling though.

There's not that much to understand, and you said it yourself- it's what's comfortable. Radio is listened to primarily (really, almost exclusively) in cars and in offices. It's a passive medium, just on in the background while the listener is doing something else.

That's why "shaking things up" rarely works in radio. For the most part, listeners don't want a challenge or to be actively entertained, they just want some inoffensive noise to keep them company.

Re:Satellite Radio is a joke

[Anonymous Coward]

When I think of satellite radio, I think of this:
*Major genres unrepresented.
*Station playlists that would become predictable within a week.
*Sub-genres within all genres utterly unrepresented in general (for example, one Metal station on all of Sirius, and it only plays death metal).
*A whole slew of stations essentially devoted to playing the exact same stuff that you hear on standard Top 40 radio.
*Commercials, despite being advertised as commercial-free.
*Annoying DJs (the receivers display the name/artist playing, you do NOT need DJs trying to be funny between every song).
*Oh, and a monthly fee on top of that.

Frankly, satellite radio was created 10 years too late. Why should I put up with satellite radio when I can use my mp3 player?

Radio isn't just music. MP3 players can't give you live sports or talk yet (outside of local FM).

Re:Satellite Radio is a joke

[Anonymous Coward]

Sports and talk are generally the realm of AM radio. While true that mp3 players aren't suited for either (though it could be argued that podcasts are the mp3 player equivalent of talk), using a shortwave radio you're damn well guaranteed to be able to be able to hear the game or catch talk radio no matter where you are. And there's no monthly fee for AM radio.

Re:Satellite Radio is a joke

[altek]

Why should I put up with satellite radio when I can use my mp3 player?

I think a lot of the points you make are true. I don't have satellite radio either, but for a lot of people there is a value in it that isn't valuable to you. It's that music isn't something they want to spend real mental energy or time or money on, building a collection, having and maintaining devices to transport and play it, learning of new bands and albums, etc. They just know that they like certain types and want to select those types at will, with minimal effort. Satellite radio does exactly that.

Re:Satellite Radio is a joke

[AbandonAllHope]

*Major genres unrepresented.

Name 1. I dare you. A major genre must be a genre of music, let's say, more than 10,000 people in their market (The United States) listen to.

*Station playlists that would become predictable within a week.

No. Not even close. I have an XM system and the exact reason I have it is because the play lists are constantly in flux. Adding to the mix is that most stations have weekly radio shows that feature brand new (some of it without a label or release yet) music. An example if this is XM 82 The System's hosting of Armin van Buuren's A State of Trance. It doesn't get much fresher than the music he plays.

*Sub-genres within all genres utterly unrepresented in general (for example, one Metal station on all of Sirius, and it only plays death metal).

I'm sorry there isn't an entire channel devoted to speed metal, or 70's speed metal, or 70's speed metal by bands whose members included a man named Bart. Holy crap how can people be this picky?

*A whole slew of stations essentially devoted to playing the exact same stuff that you hear on standard Top 40 radio.

I assume you're also aware of the button on most SR receivers that forces you at gunpoint to listen to the stations you don't like (/sarcasm). Here's something you might also not be aware of : A LOT of people like that sort of music and have SR to listen to it on a nationwide, commercial free basis.

*Commercials, despite being advertised as commercial-free.

All of four XM stations have commercials. They will be gone once their contract with Clear Channel expires.

*Annoying DJs (the receivers display the name/artist playing, you do NOT need DJs trying to be funny between every song).

Most of the stations I listen to have few, if any, DJs. The DJ's name and the name of the program (For example The XMU After School Special With Toby) while she's talking and the instant the song starts the information changes. Most receivers also have the capacity to remember song names, so you can recall them later.

*Oh, and a monthly fee on top of that.

Oh, I forgot, I'm on slashdot where everything should be free and Economics is a dirty word. You're a real peach there Anonymous Coward - OH MY GOD A FEE HOW DAAAARE THEY BWAAAAAAAAAAAAA ADS TOO?!!?!? You can't have it both ways.

When I think of your post, I think this:
*Someone call this guy a wahmbulance.

Re:Satellite Radio is a joke

[zumajim]

I rely on radio (any kind of radio) for discovering new music. Your iPod/MP3 player isn't going to offer you anything you don't put on it. And I have to admit that I've heard a lot of great new stuff on XM since I subscribed last year. And no DJs and commercials either. Works for me.

Re:Satellite Radio is a joke

[loraksus]

Radio isn't just music. MP3 players can't give you live sports or talk yet (outside of local FM).

Wrong audience.
People on /. will download the commercial free torrent 20 minutes after the game or bitch at each other right her on /. , thank you very much.

Re:Satellite Radio is a joke

[Enry]

Have you ever listened to satellite radio? I'm not sure who modded you up, but they (and you) have no clue.

There's a few top-40 stations, but I never hear them. I have my favorite songs and groups programmed in and it'll alert me when any of them appear on any channel (try doing that, HD Radio).

There's a monthly fee. There's a monthly fee for your Internet service too I bet. So what?

I'm not sure where you get commercials from. A few stations have them, and I don't think any of the music ones on Sirius do (Clear Channel programs some on XM and thus do).

What genres are unrepresented? There seems to be a great mix.

Re:Satellite Radio is a joke

[hal2814]

"Radio isn't just music. MP3 players can't give you live sports or talk yet (outside of local FM)."

Interesting you should make this point because the talk aspect is what kept me from even considering satellite radio. There's no such thing as local sports talk on satellite radio. National sports shows are ok but they generally talk far too often about college football teams I don't care about and sports leagues like the NBA that just aren't popular around here. You also can't pick up Clark Howard. At the time I let my free trial expire, there was also no local weather or traffic but I think they've done something about that. Back when I had the free trial, I spent maybe 10 minutes of my daily commute of 60-70 minutes listening to the satellite. The rest of the time was spent listening to AM. To be fair, I didn't touch the FM dial while I had satellite.

Re:Satellite Radio is a joke

[grumling]

You must be a Sirius subscriber. I started out with them, but wanted the XM portable receiver. I'm very happy I switched. XM has 2-3 channels I would call "metal" (I'm not a good judge of that), 4 Jazz channels, 3 classical channels (with higher quality/bitrates than normal channels), a few channels that play all sorts of strange stuff. And their pop-style channels have a much larger playlist than what I heard on Sirius (I switched just after they picked up Stern so maybe things have changed, but it doesn't sound like it).

Re:Satellite Radio is a joke

[corychristison]

You've obviously never been to a rural area.

I live in Saskatchewan, Canada.

Right now I am working as a distributor for a small company based in Moose Jaw.

My job, essentially, is to drive around the province as a specialized courier in a vehicle provided for me.

None of the vehicles have CD players, AUX in, or any options other than an AM/FM Tuner. And wearing headphones while driving is illegal in some places -- so an MP3 player is out of the question.

Sirius radio is more targeted towards this kind of market. I don't like having to press the seek button every hour or so.

My brother has two subscriptions. I have two subscriptions. My mom has one, and looking at getting another for her store. My sister and her husband are looking into it.

I, personally, think that Sirius/XM seem to know what their doing.

Satellite Radio isn't for you. If you don't like it, DON'T BUY IT. Simple as that.

Re:Satellite Radio is a joke

[Dark_Gravity]

*Major genres unrepresented.

I find Industrial, EBM, and other staples in my listening tastes are unrepresented, but I don't consider those "major" genres.

*Station playlists that would become predictable within a week.

Sometimes this is true, but for me there are other good Sirius stations to listen to for a while, and by the time I make it back to a station that got too predictable, they have usually updated the playlist.

*Sub-genres within all genres utterly unrepresented in general (for example, one Metal station on all of Sirius, and it only plays death metal).

I agree with the initial statement, but I find your example inaccurate. My statement about Industrial & EBM can be expanded to include Cyberpunk, Darkwave, etc, all of which I would consider subgenres of electronic.

Hard Attack, Hair Nation, Octane, and Buzzsaw all play various niches of Metal. Buzzsaw mixes the metal with hard rock, and Hair Nation is old pop metal. Octane is pretty much nothing but Nu-Metal. (I hate that term, but some the bands in that category are pretty good.) Hard Attack is the station the you mistakenly think plays nothing but Death Metal. Hard Attack is certainly the hardest metal station on Sirius, but to call their playlist "all death metal" is extremely inaccurate.

*A whole slew of stations essentially devoted to playing the exact same stuff that you hear on standard Top 40 radio.

I can't offer comment on that since I don't listen to Top 40 terrestrial radio, or the satellite counterpart stations.

*Commercials, despite being advertised as commercial-free.

That depends on what stations you are talking about. The Sirius music channels are indeed commercial free. They advertise commercial free music, not that all channels are commercial free. I don't consider DJs announcing what's happening on other Sirius stations as commercials, anymore than I would consider concert announcements to be commercials.

*Annoying DJs (the receivers display the name/artist playing, you do NOT need DJs trying to be funny between every song).

Some people listen to the radio while doing things other than stare at the radio's display. Not having to run over to the display to get the name of a new band or song you just heard is not a bad thing.

There is some total wanker on Faction who is an absolute dickweed with an annoying British accent and nothing but lame, boastful, egotistical commentary that actually prevents me from tuning that station in, because he annoys me so much. Otherwise, they have a remarkable collection of unrivaled on air talent. One of the things I like about Sirius is the quality DJs. They make Sirius a satellite radio provider, whereas XM is simply a satellite feed of someone's MP3s grouped by genre, and played on eternal shuffle. While that aspect of XM sometimes has appeal, it isn't radio to me.

*Oh, and a monthly fee on top of that.

Frankly, satellite radio was created 10 years too late. Why should I put up with satellite radio when I can use my mp3 player?

Because sometimes it is nice to let someone else be the DJ.

Of course, since Satellite radio is a premium service, no one is forcing you you to put up with anything. Even though it has a wider variety of better programming, and better broadcast coverage than terrestrial radio, you don't have to subscribe.

Re:Satellite Radio is a joke

[gumpish]

It's clearly selling though.

Right. Selling so well that if the companies don't merge they'll both die.

Re:Satellite Radio is a joke

[nawcom]

I find Industrial, EBM, and other staples in my listening tastes are unrepresented, but I don't consider those "major" genres.

I completely agree. This is the missing piece that they have; something you and I and many other people wish was there. Hopefully they will add it. Unfortunately, people still feel all electronic music is the same, so they feel some channel with a constant feed of repetitive house music will satisfy them all.

Re:Satellite Radio is a joke

[Miamicanes]

>*Station playlists that would become predictable within a week.

And you've just identified the #1 reason why so many Sirius AND XM subscribers are opposed to the merger -- we both like our respective satellite services EXACTLY the way they are. Sirius channels are hit-based and programmed like ideal big-city FM stations, sans commercials. XM channels have deeper and more esoteric playlists. To a Sirius fan, XM sounds like someone bought a pile of B-stock CDs from the bargain bin, dumped them into a changer, and hit the "randomize" button. To an XM fan, Sirius sounds like someone locked a DJ into a booth with one single "${catchy_name} Hits 2k8" CD and forced them to play it overAndOverAndOver.

One thing that's often overlooked in the "Sirius/XM have competition from terrestrial radio/ipods/etc" argument -- the overwhelming majority of people who actually BELIEVE it *aren't* Sirius or XM subscribers. Sirius and XM subscribers subscribe precisely BECAUSE they think terrestrial radio sucks, ipods aren't realtime, and anyone who thinks you can stream internet media wirelessly through most of the western US (and a fairly big chunk of the EASTERN US, for that matter) is seriously deluded about the availability of high-speed cellular broadband in non-urban areas. For the proud elite who subscribe to Sirius or XM, there IS no acceptable alternative to satellite radio.

The worst thing about the merger isn't the prospect of higher rates. Compared to what I spend every month on wireless voice & data service, satellite TV, broadband, mortgage, HOA fees, and everything else, it's below the threshold of consciousness. Rather, it's the prospect of having "duplicate" (to someone in upper management) channels from Sirius and XM "merged", so Sirius can use the freed-up bandwidth to broadcast "Backseat Barney" videos. NOBODY, with the possible exception of diehard sports fans who listen to nothing BUT sports, would EVER mistake Sirius music content for XM music content, and vice-versa. They're as different as night and day. Partly, because when they were competing, they HAD to discover their respective niches and aggressively appeal to them.

Today is a very sad day for subscribers of BOTH services.

Re:Satellite Radio is a joke

[Stu Charlton]

I listen to Sirius and there are several metal stations...

- Octane (plays NuMetal-ish stuff)
- Hair Nation (80s hair bands)
- Buzzsaw (ac/dc, ozzy, rush, metallica etc)
- Hard Attack (which you say plays death metal, but I've seen everything from metalcore to classic judas priest & sabbath).

That's pretty good representation.

One thing missing, I think, is a good IDM or Electronica station. Area 33 on Sirius is Trance, but there's not much IDM....

Re:Satellite Radio is a joke

[lavalamp70]

When I think of satellite radio, I think of this: *Major genres unrepresented. *Station playlists that would become predictable within a week. *Sub-genres within all genres utterly unrepresented in general (for example, one Metal station on all of Sirius, and it only plays death metal). *A whole slew of stations essentially devoted to playing the exact same stuff that you hear on standard Top 40 radio. *Commercials, despite being advertised as commercial-free. *Annoying DJs (the receivers display the name/artist playing, you do NOT need DJs trying to be funny between every song). *Oh, and a monthly fee on top of that.

Frankly, satellite radio was created 10 years too late. Why should I put up with satellite radio when I can use my mp3 player?

Which major genres are unrepresented? I believe all the 'majors' are there.. I'll listen to the same channel all week, from 0600 to 1400 Eastern time and have yet to find playlists 'predictable' I believe Buzzsaw AND Hair Nation play metal. I haven't listened to top 40 crap in 25 years, so I wouldn't know about that one... I have yet to hear commercials in three plus years of listening to Sirius.... Annoying DJ's? They only blab for 5 seconds every 4-6 songs. Compared to the local clowns/morning show garbage, I can deal with 5 seconds. Besides - I pause mine when I walk away from my work station so I'll skip over the yakking anyway. Monthly fee? You don't have cable/dish tv, do you??

Better deals ahead? You decide.

[patmanDC]

http://www.siriusmerger.com/

http://www.siriusmerger.com/uploads/ala-cart-Press-Rel-7-23-07.pdf

Oversight as usual

[jevvim]

In the beginning, there were a lot more ads on satellite radio. One of the two companies (I forget which) decided to focus on ad-free music channels; amazingly, the other company reduced the number of channels with ads as well. Post-merger, I'm concerned that Big Satellite (B.S.) will finally take aim at the terrestrial market. With only one satellite service type, how long until we see automobiles that come with a free B.S. receiver but the terrestrial receiver (AM/FM) costs extra? To me, though, it comes down to the apparent difference between Republican and Democratic oversight: Republicans reject regulations unless a direct fault can be seen (well, satellite competes with terrestrial, so it's not a monopoly) whereas Democrats demand regulations unless a direct fault can be guaranteed not to happen (well, they could become a monopoly, so forbid them from merging). I'm curious how much the FCC could "change" this decision in a year, should the executive branch return to Democratic hands.

Re:Oversight as usual

[jd]

If they're willing to pay twenty million dollars to whoever criticizes the combined company, expect lots of trivial criticisms followed by sudden silence. Frankly, there are very few radio stations worth a damn any more, because of excessive mergers and over-generous media ownership rules. Radio Caroline is still ok, but they've alway been wiling to be different.

Re:Oversight as usual

[WhatAmIDoingHere]

"how long until we see automobiles that come with a free B.S. receiver but the terrestrial receiver (AM/FM) costs extra?"

Never. A lot of people like the idea of local radio with weather, traffic, and news. And as long as a lot of customers want the free AM/FM, the car companies will include the radio.

Re:Oversight as usual

[zonker]

GOOD. Let them take aim at the terrestrial market. It could only improve things!

ClearChannel, Cumulus Media, Citadel Broadcasting and Infinity (CBS Radio) own most of the stations nationwide, in that order. Most of them repeat the same crap anyway and any local flavor has long since disappeared. Maybe if they started getting worried that they might have to WORK for their money the quality of local broadcasting might improve.

Isn't that what Republicans call that "letting the free market work it out"?

BTW, the issue with car radio receivers going to satellite only is between YOU and the CAR COMPANY. If you don't want that to happen then take it up with them.

Re:Oversight as usual

[WhatAmIDoingHere]

I've been using my XM subscription a lot more recently, and I've noticed that the stations I listen to also repeat the same crap over and over. Squizz is the worst with it! I mean, how many times can someone hear "Too Drunk (to Fuck)" before going on a killing spree? Also, how do you go from Tool, Godsmack and Nine Inch Nails to Nickleback and Kid Rock? I don't think there's any way of making that transition smooth.

Re:Oversight as usual

[zonker]

If you don't like XM then get rid of it or tell them to make it better. Or change the channel, there are a lot of them after all. Certainly a wider range than you get on most cities terrestrial stations.

Re:Oversight as usual

[LVSlushdat]

I bought a new car in May, it came with built-in XM, am just about to the end of the 3 mon free trial.. I gotta STRONG feeling the XM capability is going to be unused in the near future.. I've gotten pestered by XM starting about two weeks after I bought the car, at the time I told them I'd wait till closer to the end of the free trial... Now, the last one I told him to STFU and get off my phone.. I'll be damned if I'm gonna pay $15/mo to listen more of the "male enhancement" ads that terrestrial radio seems to love... Thank God that the radio has MP3/CD capability..

Re:Oversight as usual

[WhatAmIDoingHere]

I haven't heard a single ad on XM radio...

Re:Oversight as usual

[SomeoneGotMyNick]

You mean you have no idea what GoToMyPC.com is?

No place to go.

[Anonymous Coward]

I had considered XM radio then the merger rumors started to fly so I held back. The problem I have is supporting content I strongly dislike. I can't stand Howard Stern. Yes I know he's God to some people but it reminds me of high school and I escaped from that place a long time ago. I was thrilled when he went satellite but it did drop Sirus off the options list. Now if I get satellite period I have to help pay his over sized paycheck for being annoying. I realized most reading this are likely to be fans but he creeps me out. One of the reasons for preventing monopolies is to give you options. You get to vote with your money. My only vote left is to not financially support satellite radio and hope it goes away. Not much of a choice involved. Far more important than ala cart cable we need ala cart satellite radio. Then everyone has options. There are plenty of Sternies to keep him afloat and I can have my rock stations. I competely agree about DJs and I thought the point of Satellite was to avoid them as well as commercials? DJ are there to save a buck no matter what they claim. Their mindless chatter is cheaper than playing music. I'm stuck in Phoenix now and when I drive back to LA I notice a massive difference. Here there's at least half the air time that is DJs and commercials with little actual music. Two thirds is music in LA. If I'm paying a fee can't we have at least a handful of rock stations and not have a bloody playlist?

Re:No place to go.

[Anonymous Coward]

I can't stand Howard Stern garbage either. I suspect that there were a fair number of XM users who felt this way, who will most likely let their membership expire now. So, in the end, it will be the Howard Stern radio with a some people who do not care. You would wonder if the accountants did a study to the number of people that he drove away versus those that he attracted. He really does poison satellite radio for me.

Re:No place to go.

[Isotopian]

Yeah, there are very few people who care THAT much that they'd drop their subscription because they didn't want to be able to NOT listen to Howard Stern.

Re:No place to go.

[Enry]

My dad hates Stern with a passion (I like him, but that's just me). After listening to Sirius in my car for a while, he decided he wants it. He's had it and has enjoyed it for two years. I don't think he's ever once come across Stern by accident.

I don't like some of the channel selections that is on Sirius (I don't want my money going towards Fox News), but that's the choice I'm given. The benefits of Sirius outweighs the few pennies I send to Roger Ailes every months.

And yes, I can't stand O&A, but I won't cancel my subscription if they were on Sirius. Get over yourself.

Re:No place to go.

[Anonymous Coward]

then change the channel... that hard to do?

Re:No place to go.

[yamiyasha]

There is Ala-cart subscription, you don't need stern

Re:No place to go.

[hansamurai]

Why would someone drop XM/Sirius because of Howard Stern? According to their respective wiki pages, Sirius has 135 channels and XM currently has something like 150 channels. Does Howard Stern play on all channels at once or something? I still listen to radio even though I could still potentially hear Rush Limbaugh on it. I still watch TV even though I could potentially see Nancy Grace on it. Sometimes people's logic escapes me.

Baba booey! Baba booey!

[memiliesm]

Sorry, someone had to do it.

There's always HD radio

[Newer Guy]

You know...the one with: "The stations between the stations"? OK..never mind....

The problem is too much regulation

[Affenkopf]

Why did the FCC only grant two satellite licences? It's not like there's limited bandwith. Now that Sirius and XM merge and the FCC still doesn't allow new satellite companies there's no competition at all.

Re:The problem is too much regulation

[rossdee]

How come the FCC even has jurisdiction over satellite radio? (I guess on this case both companies are based in the US so have to fo;;ow US laws, but anybody from another country that can afford ut ciuld put up thier own satellite using Russian or Eurpean launches...)

Re:The problem is too much regulation

[goaliemn]

um... there is limited bandwidth. they have specific frequency ranges they can use, so there is a definite hard limit.

Re:The problem is too much regulation

[goaliemn]

If you have a satellite and it transmits into a country, they do have some say in it. Or, if its a worldwide service (like GPS) it goes to the ITU, which sets alot of the radio band plans around the world and helps coordinate them between different countries.

Re:The problem is too much regulation

[Miamicanes]

>Why did the FCC only grant two satellite licences? It's not like there's limited bandwith.

Actually, there IS. Go google "SDARS".

The reason you don't need a dish to receive Sirius or XM is because they broadcast a signal that's strong enough to receive with just an antenna, and just as importantly, because they have the exclusive use of their respective band of SDARS frequencies throughout North America (and southern Canada, northern Mexico, and the Caribbean, for that matter).

Sirius divides its band into 3 blocks, and has 3 satellites in modified Molniya orbits (I think there's a fourth satellite up there as a spare). At any given moment, one of the satellites is on the other side of the earth, and two are visible from North America. Most of the time, one satellite will appear to be almost directly "straight up", and the other will be somewhere near the horizon. This works wonderfully for Sirius, because the "up" satellite is usually high enough to keep things like mountains and valleys from interfering with reception, while the "horizon" satellite increases the likelihood of getting good reception when you're parked under the roof of a gas station. The terrestrial repeaters fill in most of the remaining gaps. They handle the "overpass problem" by time-delaying and buffering the audio program by several seconds, and sending chunks of it out-of-order via the two visible satellites and terrestrial repeaters. Thus, if your signal gets interrupted for a half second because you drove under an overpass, it doesn't really matter, because the data is missed from satellite #1 was already sent by satellite #2 and/or the nearest repeater (or will be, a second or two later), so that when the time comes to actually PLAY it in another few seconds, at least one copy of the necessary data will be in the buffer.

The benefit of Sirius' satellite strategy is that you can get great reception in a moving vehicle just about everywhere in America. The downside is that if you're listening from a fixed location (like a home), and you're trying to get by with a single antenna sitting on a windowsill (vs an outdoor antenna with clear view of both the sky AND horizon), you're going to have to move the antenna to a different windowsill every few hours, because their satellites don't stay in one place.

By comparison, XM's satellites aren't quite as interesting. They're just a pair of conventional geostationary satellites sitting ~22k miles above the equator, with lots and lots of terrestrial repeaters to compensate for things like mountains and tall buildings that might block the view to the south.

With DBS services like DirecTV or Dish Network, the dish's purpose isn't to capture enough of a weak signal from a distant satellite to decode... it's to capture a lot MORE of the signal coming from one specific satellite, so that they can attenuate the signal (causing weaker signals from adjacent satellites to drop out) and re-amplify what's left. If there were only a single DBS provider, broadcasting a single beam from a single satellite over a single block of frequencies, you wouldn't need a dish to receive THAT, either.

Finally!

[agwis]

Ultimately this will benefit the consumer. I've subscribed to both companies and my preference is for talk radio/sports. The competition for paid subscribers forced the 2 companies to continually one-up each other for exclusive content and caused problems for me when one company would win the contract from another at renewal time (nascar, baseball, etc.) At one point I had to give up programming I enjoyed listening too or pay for a second receiver with a second subscription in order to keep it.

In the last few years, I've noticed the quality of the programming has deteriorated considerably as well. Once the companies are merged, all the duplicate costs for talent, administration, customer service, etc. should be eliminated and hopefully benefit the customers with a much improved service. My understanding is that nobody will even need to buy new hardware as the channels will be combined on your existing radio.

This is not a monopoly in the sense that we cannot get similar service from another provider. If you find satellite too expensive, or don't like what they have too offer, then get rid of it and listen to terrestrial radio, or your ipod, mp3 player, etc.

What I would be more concerned about than anything else to do with this merger is the question why did this take so long to pass? Oil companies have merged in a fraction of the time with minimal resistance compared to this one!

Re:Finally!

[Jeff DeMaagd]

The problem is that they did break regulations, and another was that the condition of the original license that they not merge, and only a few years later, they whine about the conditions that they themselves explicitly agreed to abide.

Also XM had more powerful repeaters than allowed, and they were not located where they said they would be when they applied to install them. They also allowed hardware licensees to produce FM transmitters that were a lot more powerful than the license allows. They've also been extremely generous to the CEO and other people with unnecessarily large perks in the time of supposed financial hardship - the hardship being in large people due to the actions of the people getting the perks!

Another is the fact that the new monopoly would make it needlessly hard for competitors to break into sat radio, not only is the infrastructure expensive, they've already demonstrated that they'll do anything to beat the newcomer out by spending ridiculous sums of money and violate their licenses to do so.

This is not a monopoly in the sense that we cannot get similar service from another provider. If you find satellite too expensive, or don't like what they have too offer, then get rid of it and listen to terrestrial radio, or your ipod, mp3 player, etc.

Those are not similar service except that they're all audio. Mp3 players can't tune live anything except through an FM tuner, and terrestrial radio is irritating to use on a trip, when you lose signal every 50-100 miles, you need to hunt around for another tolerable station, not to mention an excess of irritating ads. Maybe a similar service might be radio through cellular network, but that's not near maturity yet, there's no telling if it ever will be.

Re:Finally!

[Anonymous Coward]

Oil is an excellent lubricant, especially when converted into cash.

Ok, Mr. Genius

[Anonymous Coward]

From the post: FCC Chairman Kevin Martin confirmed the final vote Friday night. 'I think it's going to be, in the end, a good thing for consumers and be in the public interest,' he told The Associated Press."

"The greater the market share, the better it is for the customers" has never been true.

So, Mr. Martin, do you care to elaborate why this merger is in the public interest? Try hard, as it stands all your previous statements aren't good enough to fool a single slashdotter.

No Comparable Competition

[Anonymous Coward]

The problem lies in the fact that now there is no comparable competition. If the customer wants unedited, uncensored satellite radio, they have only one choice. This gives the provider greater strength in the business transaction, seemingly unlimited freedom to add or change commercials, content or programing.

This is analogous to my internet provider. Although good, I have no choice except my current one if I want a speed higher than 5mbs. No one in my area offers anything comparable. I do realize that there are other providers, but they do not have the comparable speed, hence do not receive my patronage.

Re:No Comparable Competition

[sssssss27]

You could always just get a cell phone with an unlimited data plan and then steam internet music to your receiver. That's what I plan on doing once Pandora supports Windows Mobile. I know Pandora already supports the iPhone and some other ATT or Sprint phones.

Internet Radio

[Strange Ranger]

When you can stream a seemingly unlimited supply of internet radio straight to most connected devices, like the iPhone for one...
satellite radio seems almost quaint. How long will it be before "internet radio" puts satellite radio totally out of business?

BTW, for iPhone and iPod touch users, here's a good place to start:
http://www.seeqpod.com/

If you just want a radio gadget, there seem to be a few good ones available now:
http://www.google.com/search?client=googlet&q=portable%20internet%20radio
Of course with these you can't play "kill your battery" using them over a 3G network... but then there's always the next thing..

Re:Internet Radio

[MtViewGuy]

Except for one thing: streaming Internet radio only works if you pretty much close to standing still (e.g., if you are at a Wi-Fi "hotspot" or if your device is directly connected to broadband connction). If you driving--especially on long-distance trips--satellite radio is a better choice, especially west of the Mississippi River, where far fewer metropolitan areas exist.

Re:Internet Radio

[grumling]

From AT&T's terms of service:

"Prohibited and Permissible Uses: Except as may otherwise be specifically permitted or prohibited for select data plans, data sessions may be conducted only for the following purposes: (i) Internet browsing; (ii) email; and (iii) intranet access (including access to corporate intranets, email, and individual productivity applications like customer relationship management, sales force, and field service automation). The Data Plans and Features MAY NOT be used for any other purpose. While most common uses for Intranet browsing, email and intranet access are permitted by your data plan, there are certain uses that cause extreme network capacity issues and interference with the network and are therefore prohibited. ...Accordingly, AT&T reserves the right to (i) limit throughput or amount of data transferred and/or deny, disconnect, modify and/or terminate Service, without notice, to anyone it believes is using the Service in any manner prohibited or whose usage adversely impacts its wireless network or service levels or hinders access to its wireless network, including without limitation, after a significant period of inactivity or after sessions of excessive usage and (ii) otherwise protect its wireless network from harm, compromised capacity or degradation in performance, which may impact legitimate data flows. You may not send solicitations to AT&T's wireless subscribers without their consent. You may not use the Services other than as intended by AT&T and applicable law. Plans are for individual, non-commercial use only and are not for resale. AT&T may, but is not required to, monitor your compliance, or the compliance of other subscribers, with AT&T's terms, conditions, or policies."

Just foggy enough to make it easy for them to lock you out. And, I've noticed that my Internet Radio application often times just gets stuck on "buffering" forever, even though I have excellent signal and haven't changed anything. I can't wait for the first iPhone streamer to post a rant to The Consumerist when they cancel his account for excessive bandwidth use.

Re:Internet Radio

[Secrity]

For me there is no competition to satellite radio. XM and Sirius works in my car, internet radio doesn't -- and terrestrial radio sucks. I don't mind paying a reasonable subscription fee for satellite radio, but allowing them to become an unregulated monopoly is a very bad thing.

Re:Internet Radio

[areusche]

Well you can 2.99$ a month you can subscribe you sirius's 128 kbps web stream. Most of their exclusive content is available on it as well. You can try it out for free for 3 days I believe. It's a great online music source.

Re:Internet Radio

[Anonymous Coward]

Both Satellite providers offer Internet streaming radio. With technologies like EVDO and WiMAX in fact, I can listen to Sirius on my Nokia N810 in quite a few different locations - without the need for a satellite receiver. Sirius already has the Stiletto, which can jump on any Wifi signal to play via the Internet. Also, my Samsung phone plays selected Sirius stations via EVDO. I suspect more and more devices will have built in Satellite alternatives, but the companies themselves will most likely not die. They're smart about what they're doing - they're legitimizing, standardizing, and setting up to profit (arguably) on Satellite Radio.

Re:Internet Radio

[Anonymous Coward]

XM provides internet streaming for free :-) ... Plus, no Stern!

Re:Internet Radio

[snoogans126]

Sirius streaming is free (for subscribers of course) The $2.99 is only for their 128k "CD quality" streaming. And you do get stern.

Stern: I Will Never Vote For a Democrat Again

[Coolhand2120]

Howard Stern has some pretty choice words about the FCC's decision here: http://www.businessandmedia.org/articles/2008/20080724152511.aspx

Stern took it a step even further and called Democrats on the FCC "communists" and referred to their tactics as "gangsterism."

I don't necessarily agree with Stern, just adding some relevant info.

Re:Stern: I Will Never Vote For a Democrat Again

[rudy_wayne]

Howard Stern has been whining about the merger since day one and and ranting about how it's not a monopoly. But it's all bullshit. The only thing he cares about is himself -- if the merger is approved it probably means more money for him. After one year on satellite he got an $82 million bonus because Sirius reached certain subscriber levels. If the merger doesn't go through Sirius might go under and he doesn't get the rest of his $500 million.

Re:Stern: I Will Never Vote For a Democrat Again

[barzok]

If the merger doesn't go through, Sirius will keep going. It may be a struggle, but they'll keep going. It's XM that needs this merger to go through if they want to stay afloat.

Re:Stern: I Will Never Vote For a Democrat Again

[btellier]

But it's all bullshit. The only thing he cares about is himself -- if the merger is approved it probably means more money for him. After one year on satellite he got an $82 million bonus because Sirius reached certain subscriber levels. If the merger doesn't go through Sirius might go under and he doesn't get the rest of his $500 million.

He's said repeatedly that the $500 million is in escrow, meaning that he gets it whether they close shop or not. Oh, and do you think he would've ever gotten $500 million for going to satellite if there was only one satellite radio company? If there was only Sirius, they would've only had to pay him more than terrestrial, or about $10 mil a year.

He's pissed because it took the DoJ and FCC 16 months to make a decision on something as trivial as SATELLITE RADIO, when it took only 10 months to merge Exxon-Mobil.

Re:Stern: I Will Never Vote For a Democrat Again

[cowscows]

I'm pretty neutral on Howard Stern in general, but why should anyone give a rats ass what he thinks about something like this? He's done very well for himself as a guy who will say controversial things on the radio, good for him. Why that makes his opinion useful or worthwhile on something like government regulation and potential monopoly issues...I just don't see it.

But regardless of how well informed he is on the issue, someone stating that they're going to discount something as broad as an entire political party over something as minor as two merging radio stations is someone who's not using their whole brain.

It is not a monopoly because others can enter

[howardd21]

In addition to the issues others have already raised, that Satellite radio competes with other delivery forms (AM/FM, iPods, etc,) of the same basic service (music, news, etc.), what is keeping a new company from seeing an opening and starting up?

Re:It is not a monopoly because others can enter

[maxume]

FCC licensing, enormous capital costs, enormous startup costs (you have to get people to buy your special receiver), etc.

If You Work For XM

[rudy_wayne]

Kiss your ass goodbye.

For a long rime I could figure it out. Why would two companies, both losing hundreds of millions of dollars a year, want to merge? How does that make sense? Then I realized -- if Sirius gets XM's subscriber revenue (XM has more subscribers than Sirius) and eliminates as many XM employees as possible -- presto!! They are instantly profitable!

Re:If You Work For XM

[v1]

in that way it does make economical sense. If there are two companies in a market that are competing for business, with fickle customers that will change loyalties in a heartbeat for a coupon, you can be running on an unreasonably low margin. Merge them, and for one you can completely dump one of the marketing departments. If the services are similar enough you may even be able to remove some of the now redundant infrastructure. Satellites are expensive.

Re:If You Work For XM

[grumling]

Except that most people can't switch with a coupon. If their factory installed stereo came from GM, it is ready for XM, not Sirius. If they drive a Dodge, Sirius not XM. While I agree that if someone specifically wants one service over the other, they would purchase on the after market, a large number of people just wouldn't bother if they didn't want the service their car comes with. It just isn't important enough for them to make the switch. And as one who regularly deals with the after market solution, I have to say it really clutters up the dash to have a satellite radio, tape adapter and power cables all over.

A single encoding/emission standard may have made the service a lot more popular. Imagine if your Delco FM radio didn't pick up stations that were transmitted in the RCA format.

give them a cookie!

[v1]

Tate had insisted that the companies settle charges that they violated FCC rules before she would approve the deal. The companies agreed this week to pay $19.7 million to the U.S. Treasury for violations related to radio receivers and ground-based signal repeaters.

Oh well that's different! They agreed to pay their fines! We should give them a reward for being such good little boys.

And when I go downtown to pay my speeding ticket I expect nothing less than a thank-you card and a candybar.

What's WRONG with these people?

Re:give them a cookie!

[kramerd]

Tate had insisted that the companies settle charges that they violated FCC rules before she would approve the deal. The companies agreed this week to pay $19.7 million to the U.S. Treasury for violations related to radio receivers and ground-based signal repeaters.

Oh well that's different! They agreed to pay their fines! We should give them a reward for being such good little boys.

And when I go downtown to pay my speeding ticket I expect nothing less than a thank-you card and a candybar.

What's WRONG with these people?

No, you idiot.

The fines are a condition of the approval of the merger. Without the necessity of FCC approval, these fines were never charged, as the companies weren't making money from the violations related to receivers. XM and sirius agreed to pay the fines as a merger condition. Maybe if I repeat myself a couple more times, you will catch on.

When you go to pay your speeding ticket, you are a consumer (as opposed to a producer), so you should not expect a reward. A speeding ticket is a punishment for improper consumption of government property for personal use (roads). When a producer breaks the law it affects all consumers of their product, and thus fines may further affect consumers of the product. When fines get so large that consumers are negatively affected, they often get reduced such that the producer learns the mistake that was made and consumers have a chance to react to the inevitable changes that are coming.

Re:give them a cookie!

[stinerman]

When fines get so large that consumers are negatively affected, they often get reduced such that the producer learns the mistake that was made and consumers have a chance to react to the inevitable changes that are coming.

Or the producer figured out that they could make more in profits by flouting a law than the actual penalty.

Let's put it this way, if I can save $1,000,000 by dumping my company's waste byproducts in the local river and the fine for illegal dumping is less than $1,000,000, the smart business decision is to dump in the local river. Better yet, I can just contribute to my local politician's campaign to the tune of a few thousand dollars and buy a law that allows me to dump in the river for free.

Fines for violating laws must be punitive in nature otherwise they're just another cost of doing business.

Re:give them a cookie!

[kramerd]

Not exactly. If the fine for dumping is less than the cost of not dumping, it is still unlikely that you would choose to dump. Consumer backlash from hearing that you were fined for illegal dumping means that consumers choose to purchase product from your competitors.

In the case of Sirius/XM paying fines, its not the same situation. The fines in question are based , as I said, on condition of merger for prior laws broken. The condition here is such that without the competition within satellite radio, consumers are hurt by the use of radio receivers and ground based signal repeaters. The thing about the FCC is that Sirius/XM cannot just donate to local politicians, as local politics dont really apply to national private issues. They cannot donate to the FCC to get their way, because the consumer backlash would drive FCC leadership out for not properly representing their constituents. Your example just doesn't apply here, due to the business issues, not political ones. If sirius/xm had a business model that ran on keeping making abortion illegal or subsidizing satellite radio for farmers, your point might hold water.

Fines are a cost of doing business. What financial model do you have that doesn't take risk vs reward into account? Fines for violating laws on a punitive basis defeat the purpose of having a free market. Local consumers will decide whether dumping in the river is a cause for not purchasing from a local company. They can choose to purchase from a company that chooses to dump in the river, or one that jumps through legislative hoops and increases the pricing of product. Obviously, if the options are dumping in the local river or not and cost is not a factor, then factor becomes whether or not consumers care. More obviously, larger companies have stricter regulation, and arent the ones dumping waste into local rivers (at least they dont get caught). If there is a valid, profitable market for something, it will exist, and competition will also exist. If not, then since no one wants it, there could still be a niche market. Not worth the price? Then the product isn't valid. If a product is necessary for consumers to survive, it will be subsidized by government (gas prices...how the hell is gas only $4 a gallon in the US anyway?). If not, it is simply a consumer demand, with risk vs reward played out by the consumer (tobacco), and will have appropriate competition and government interference (taxes, which just raise the cost to the consumer).

Let's go through your post, which you blindly throw up on message boards (I've seen it here multiple times, and its still misguided), from the POV of an actual company, with a real example: Apple. Consumers want the latest apple crap. You could throw the apple logo on a toaster, and sell a few million of em for 8x the cost of a traditional toaster (lets call it the fanboi toaster, and if the idea of an apple toaster offends you, replace it with any apple product you have actually purchased in the past but no longer use). But wait, not just any fanboi toaster - it comes with a 2 year contract with a national electricity supplier. I may just want the toaster, and not care about the fact that the fanboi toaster is compatible with itunes, but my friends will think Im not cool if I dont have one, so I pony up, even though there literally thousands of competing mp3 players and toasters that cost less and give me more. Apple has a choice: It can put 1,000,000 into R&D to build this "awesome" fanboi toaster, or it can buy every employee at HQ coffee for a year (replace coffee with any product that employees use and employers decide whether or not to provide. If the ROI of employee coffee isnt higher than the profits from the fanboi toaster, then the smart business decision is to have sleepy apple employees who come up with concepts like selling the iphone with a contract. Better yet, apple can donate some cash to politicians to make coffee either illegal or taxed to the point that coffee drinkers either reduce or remove consumption, on the false premise

Re:give them a cookie!

[Anonymous Coward]

It's more like "We won't renew your drivers license unless you pay your speeding ticket." They would have been approved if they didn't owe any fines. They paid their fines and now the merger is approved.

Re:give them a cookie!

[stinerman]

Not exactly. If the fine for dumping is less than the cost of not dumping, it is still unlikely that you would choose to dump. Consumer backlash from hearing that you were fined for illegal dumping means that consumers choose to purchase product from your competitors.

I'll give you that, but the "lost business" is damn-near negligible. How many people here decided to go back to dial-up after they heard their ISP was throttling their torrents? Every large business does something that their customers don't like, but their customers don't have the fortitude to take their money elsewhere.

I agree with you 100% when there is an actual free market at work, but there almost never is.

Large businesses use the Fight Club methodology:

A new car built by my company leaves somewhere traveling at 60 mph. The rear differential locks up. The car crashes and burns with everyone trapped inside. Now, should we initiate a recall? Take the number of vehicles in the field, A, multiply by the probable rate of failure, B, multiply by the average out-of-court settlement, C. A times B times C equals X. If X is less than the cost of a recall, we don't do one.

The smaller ones usually have a conscience.

Let's go through your post, which you blindly throw up on message boards (I've seen it here multiple times, and its still misguided)

Let's not. I haven't posted this "blindly", and unless you stalk me, you don't know where else I post. I'll admit I've posted something similar when warranted, but not as much as you'd like to pretend.

Either way your reply looks like it wasted a lot of your time, so it's a net gain for me.

At least the extortion fees were paid.

[thePowerOfGrayskull]

Tate had insisted that the companies settle charges that they violated FCC rules before she would approve the deal. The companies agreed this week to pay $19.7 million to the U.S. Treasury for violations related to radio receivers and ground-based signal repeaters.

Erm... so the FCC basically held this over the companies' heads as a condition for approval? How does this differ from extortion again?

Re:At least the extortion fees were paid.

[areusche]

Because the government did it. That's why it is ok !

Lifetime

[Anonymous Coward]

Well i don't know about anyone else. But for a while sirius and evn XM have offered lifetime instead of a monthly fee. So i got into that last year. And As far as i know with the merger I will still have my lifetime. And all packages avaible to the new company. So i'm not complaining. And if sirius still offers the lifetime as of today. i'd get it soon :)
I think it's a great thing that's happening. For everyone. And people who have satalite radio seeme xcited

Monopoly

[qbzzt]

Depends on how close is the substitution. If Ford was the only company making cars, and the other options were walking and horses, they'd be a monopoly. If Ford ward the only company making SUVs, but you could buy cars and minivans from other sources, it wouldn't be a monopoly in any meaningful sense of the word.

Apple is the only company making Macs, but they don't have a meaningful monopoly because you can always use a PC.

Going under

[Ceiynt]

Ok, so now we will have one Sat Radio conglomirate. There compitition is free land radio and MP3 players. What happens when once again it is not profitable, and it desides to fold. Will good ol' Uncle Sam be there to say it's ok, we have to prop them up, for the good of the people?

Opie and Anthony + Howard Stern

[usefulidiot127]

I'll be interested to see how this works out...

Re:Opie and Anthony + Howard Stern

[computechnica]

I'm interested to see what the packages look like. I have a Samsung Nexus That can record up to 50 Hours of XM with a Timer. I record Greg and Tony to listen to at work. It would be Cool to also have the Who-Who show on my player. I also can add MP3 podcasts such as Point of Inquiry and Dogma-Free radio to the same device. Do that with a FM radio.

Re:Opie and Anthony + Howard Stern

[snoogans126]

I'd imagine about the same way that it works out now. I've never listened to O&A (They were the scabs Citadel communications brought in when when they decided to dump Howard in their 4 markets, so in my mind they'll always be scabs.) But from Howard's side of things, O&A almost never come up. And when they do come up, it's basically they really don't matter to me, good luck to them. If they somehow manage to make it up to closer to Howard's level, that might change, but I don't see that happen (at least within the time frame of Howard's current contract). In SAT form, Howard is to O&A as the President is to the Mayor of Tuttle, OK.

Re:Opie and Anthony + Howard Stern

[usefulidiot127]

I started with XM back when O&A first started on there. I never really listened to talk radio but I found their show to be really really funny. Eventually I stopped paying for XM, and now I have Sirius in my new Ford. Howard's show is great too. I miss O&A but I'd like to have both.

now...

[Anonymous Coward]

Why do they have to hand over space to niggers?

What about DirecTV

[Anonymous Coward]

I wonder what will happen with the DirecTV/XM deal.

Re:What about DirecTV

[Mean Variance]

Or the Dish/Sirius deal?

Simple, one goes bankrupt, and gets reborn...

[WoTG]

If both companies couldn't survive, the market has a fix for it. Whoever is weakest goes bankrupt first. Then someone buys it for pennies on the dollar, and tries again. This time, without debt, it probably undercuts the survivor, and runs them into bankruptcy too.

The second time around, both companies make money. The original shareholders of both loose everything. And the debt holders loose a lot, but not quite everything.

I know that I don't like monopolies, in general. But I'm not entirely sure that I like the way bankruptcy often plays out either.

In this case, I don't really care - it's satellite radio, not a necessity. But as a share holder... I worry when competitors of companies I invest in go under, it isn't necessarily a guranteed win in the long run.

Xirius or sirium

[Anonymous Coward]

whatever to call them...

maybe now care makers will actually put satellite radio in cars because there is only 1 company and they know they won't collapse.