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iPhones, FStream and the Death of Satellite Radio
Statesman writes "Only a little over a year ago, the
FCC approved the merger of XM and Sirius
satellite radio companies and the combined stock was trading at $4 a share. Despite being a monopoly — or perhaps because of it — the company is failing. They are losing subscribers, the stock is now trading around 22 cents a share (a 97% decline), and they have written off $4.8 billion dollars in stock value. So, what happened? The CEO is blaming pretty much everyone except himself and his business model. But is pay-for-bandwidth even a viable business plan anymore? With millions of iPhone and gPhone users out there, free streaming audio applications like FStream, and thousands of Internet radio stations to access, the question is: why would anyone want to pay for proprietary hardware and a limited selection of a few hundred stations all controlled by one company?"
Read on for the rest of Statesman's thoughts.
Statesman continues:
"It seems like the pay-for-broadcast business model is fundamentally flawed. First, satellite radio is a misnomer; if you are listening inside a big building, chances are you're really using WiFi radio, not satellite, which requires line-of-sight to the sky. In this mode, XM/Sirius offers less selection and higher cost than an iPhone and streaming audio client. Second, a monopoly is a monopoly. Sure, you can get dozens of ClearChannel stations in some markets, but after a while it does not matter whether they are country, top 40 or easy listening. They all have the same format of hypercharged 'personalities' and lots of ads. By contrast, the iPhone and streaming client can access thousands of stations from thousands of providers worldwide. Finally, you may say that an iPhone and service agreement are expensive compared to a satellite radio subscription, but if you already have the iPhone, the cost of adding a stream audio application is zero. And the iPhone is cheap compared to a cell phone plus an MP3 player plus a laptop plus internet access. Bottom line: a year after being granted monopoly status, Sirius is all but bankrupt and the satellite radio business model is dead. Time for the FCC to think seriously about making better use of this bandwidth."
"It seems like the pay-for-broadcast business model is fundamentally flawed. First, satellite radio is a misnomer; if you are listening inside a big building, chances are you're really using WiFi radio, not satellite, which requires line-of-sight to the sky. In this mode, XM/Sirius offers less selection and higher cost than an iPhone and streaming audio client. Second, a monopoly is a monopoly. Sure, you can get dozens of ClearChannel stations in some markets, but after a while it does not matter whether they are country, top 40 or easy listening. They all have the same format of hypercharged 'personalities' and lots of ads. By contrast, the iPhone and streaming client can access thousands of stations from thousands of providers worldwide. Finally, you may say that an iPhone and service agreement are expensive compared to a satellite radio subscription, but if you already have the iPhone, the cost of adding a stream audio application is zero. And the iPhone is cheap compared to a cell phone plus an MP3 player plus a laptop plus internet access. Bottom line: a year after being granted monopoly status, Sirius is all but bankrupt and the satellite radio business model is dead. Time for the FCC to think seriously about making better use of this bandwidth."
WiFi radio? Does Statesman mean internet radio?
Sirius has terrestrial repeaters of their signal in large cities, so even in a building in Denver, for example, a Sirius receiver would get full signal strength from their transmitter on the ground. The transition from satellite to terrestrial is seamless, it is the same signal.
My main problem with Sirius is that even on the "commercial free" channels, the DJ would ... advertise for stuff going on related to Sirius, on other channels. Also, they would repeat songs at least once per day on more than a few channels, which got aggravating if you listened to it all day long.
I recently got rid of my Sirius radios and went with Slacker, getting their G2 portable as well. Big advantages: they will stream internet radio to a Linux computer, something that Sirius will not do. Also, Slacker's selection is much better, and the "Ban" and "Next" buttons are something that you couldn't even dream of with satellite radio. The G2 will download songs over wifi to the 4 or 8 GiB of storage, and it attempts to create an internet radio experience on the go, and it really does succeed.
If I have nothing to hide, don't search me
I remember a few weeks ago when I got the new channel update: I was freaked out. Half of my presets were gone. Not just renamed, but GONE. Yeah, I was pretty upset, and my first reaction was that I was probably going to cancel as soon as Howard Stern's contract is up (I'm a big enough fan that I consider that I'm paying my monthly fee just for his two channels, every other channel I happen to get is just a bonus).
But it didn't take me too long to figure out that my old channels has just been both renamed and renumbered, and my unit wasn't smart enough to track a change in both. Sirius' "Big 80s" was replaced with "80s on 8." Sirius "Left of Center" was replaced with "Sirius-XM U." "Buzzsaw" was replaced with "Boneyard." In short, nothing whatsoever was actually LOST, I just had to do some digging.
Sirius is guilty of failure to communicate the nature of the changes they made - but as near as I can tell they haven't dropped any content. At least, no content that I listen to... but like I said, if they drop EVERY other channel in their entire lineup and then jack up the price, I'll still pay to listen to Howard anywhere I go (a pure internet feed wouldn't cut it during my commute).
I subscribe to SiriusXM as well as riding the 3G network, and if it's radio you want... hate to tell you guys, but you're going to pay a metric assload less for satellite radio versus 3G internet access.
My XM subscription costs $130 USD per year.
My 3G access (unlimited data with unlimited tethering) is $85 USD per MONTH, which is only the data plan portion of my phone bill.
My opinion on why SiriusXM is tanking? They looked at all their combined radio stations, separated the wheat from the chaff, and gave us the goddamn chaff. The one channel I listen to the most (XM82 The System) was nixed in favor of something called Area, which in comparison, sucks. Even my wife who is not a die-hard electronica fan said that the quality went downhill. They screwed around with Chill, nixed Chrome, and I am quite certain that several other stations have been screwed around with much to the dismay of SirXM's subscribers.
They need to realize that most of us subscribe for literally a handful of stations, and if you screw with them, we get pissed.
"Who modded this informative? Whoever it is must've been smokin' some of that martian pot!"
>The real problem with satellite radio is that since it competes mainly with free services
Respectfully, no, it doesn't. I'm able to hear the channel I want during a whole drive across the US and even into parts of Canada. I'm able to get traffic/weather reports as soon as I need them, instead of waiting for every 15 min (or whatever.) I have my favorite channels where I know I'm guaranteed to hear the music I want, when I want it, instead of random shuffles of what I consider to be mostly trite current hits. For example, I love classical music. I have my choice of listening to the style of classical that I want (opera, traditional, etc) instead of a melange of different types on one station. Is there a lot of repetition on the channels? On some? Yes. More now since the merger? Sadly, yeah. But satellite radio competes with free services only in terms of what I listen to. But frankly, it doesn't compete very successfully.
Bark less. Wag more.