Apart from a couple
snarky ads from the
NAB, the
XM and
Sirius merger hasn't exactly been a thrill ride, and now it looks like it's going to get even more boring. The two companies filed their initial merger application with the
FCC some 70 days ago, and the agency hasn't even started the 180-day merger review period yet -- making this the longest application-to-review delay in FCC history. Industry insiders are saying this might mean that a final decision won't be reached until 2008, and that's not even counting in the time it'll take the Justice Department to do an antitrust review. No word on what the holdup is, but between that
service outage and a loud
customer backlash in the past two weeks, XM's got some housekeeping to do in the downtime before it really has to start pitching the merger to the government.
[Via
OrbitCast]
posted May 31st 2007 8:36PM
I wish the Time Warner/America Online bar just went on forever. AOL doesn't deserve to merge with anyone.
"I wish the Time Warner/America Online bar just went on forever. AOL doesn't deserve to merge with anyone."
Actually, I can think of one. They should merge with Real. Then maybe both will explode from bloat and malware.
Satellite.
Radio.
Sucks.
FM has higher quality, no question. Why must they compress the channels so that they sound like 32kb internet radio streams? Why do there have to be 5 different stations of each genre when they could have 2 of them and make them GOOD quality?!
or how about saying that they have no commercials and MEAN IT. in my dorm cafeteria they had it but all i heard was commercials for every other goddamn station they have. PLUS it cut out every 5 minutes. what a worthless peice of shit.
I don't know what Ian and tek are talking about. You lose FM channels once you get a some miles from the tranmitters and when you are traveling it is a pain in the butt to keep having to try and find stations to listen to. With my Sirius, I can listen to the same station no matter how long/far my drive is :) The sound quality is much better than FM. They do not have any commercials and hardly ever cuts out. FM is the worthless piece of ....
I don't think either one of them have actually heard satellite radio and are just mad because they cannot afford it :) and FM sucks -- 6 songs an hour and the rest is filled with commercials.
Satellite!
Radio Sucks.
Wow, there are a lot of crazies in here...
I think it's ridiculous that they are dragging this out. The reason they are doing this is because the NAB has deep pockets in Washington. Why would they rush a merger with AT&T to make them the same size company if not bigger than they were before they broke up, but there is an issue with Satellite radio? These 2 companies merging does not stop anyone else from creating a satellite, launching it and starting their own service. Yeah it will be expensive, yeah they will be entrenched in the market and it will be difficult to get users, but there is nothing stopping someone from doing this. Now try to start your own phone company. Have fun trying to do that. Even with all the money in the world you would be hard pressed to start a new phone company without using VOIP technology. This whole process is a joke, if it was going to hurt us then so be it. But as so many people above have mentioned, XM and Sirius compete with FM more than they compete with each other. You have the choice of free radio or paid radio, with XM and Sirius they just fight for exclusive content that makes you want to sign with a paid service more than the free service. So far Sirius is winning this battle. If the Justice department doesn't approve the merger, one of these companies will go bankrupt, then we're now down to one company which is the whole point of stopping a merger.
Glad you liked the print ads! (I work for the NAB on the merger issue)
My prediction: as time goes on, XM and Sirius will a) decide that the merger is more trouble than it's worth, or b) everyone else will decide this for them already. Either way, it's dead in the water.
I don't know where anyone else lives, but here in the LA area, the FM radio stations are DREADFUL. Just the worst most unlistenable crap on the planet. Anytime a station would come on that was even halfway interesting, it would quickly be replaced with a Spanish language station. I LOVE my Sirius radio and ever since I got it, I have completely stopped listening to terrestrial radio. The NAB is against the merger because God forbid anyone dare put on something more interesting than their canned, corporate crap. The NAB is afraid of competition from satellite radio, ipods, etc. so they fight what they try to pass off as a monopoly. They wouldn't be against it otherwise. Doesn't the very fact that they consider satellite a competitive rival kind of kill thier whole argument? It will be a very sad day if satellite radio disappears, but the NAB is a very powerful force and I fear the worst. Hey NAB, if you really want to destroy other sources of entertainment, why don't you try providing a better product? Just a suggestion.
I can't belive that no one has mentioned that alot of the problems with this merger stem around the controversy of Howard Stern being on Sirius . Its common knowledge the NAB has been out for Stern since back when he was on terestrial radio.. before stern went to Sirius no one cared at all about satellite radio. I am not saying this is all to do with him but if stern wasn't on satellite this merger would have happened in record time.