As the congressional investigation of the FCC continues, a memo obtained by The Washington Post turned up complaints about the way Chairman Kevin Martin runs the agency.

"The bottom line is that the FCC process appears broken and most of the blame appears to rest with Chairman Martin," wrote Commerce and Energy Committee staff members in the April 28th memo to committee chairman Rep. John D. Dingell (D-Mich.), and Rep. Bart Stupak (D-Mich.), chairman of the subcommittee on oversight and investigations.

The memo to Dingell and Stupak said the investigation is ongoing and proposed holding hearings on the findings in June, according to The Post.

Additionally, more than 30 current and former FCC employees were interviewed, along with telecommunications industry representatives and private citizens, according to the memo. This is the first indication that the investigation has turned up material to support complaints against Martin himself.

[The Washington Post]
Thanks to everyone who sent this in!

Sirius and XM have to extend their merger agreement, again. This time, though, they're not messing around with any deadlines (since the FCC sure isn't) and so they've decided to extend the merger agreement indefinitely.

The two companies have agreed not to exercise their rights to terminate the Merger Agreement prior to May 15, 2008. In addition, they've agreed to continue to extend the merger agreement, as necessary, for rolling 2-week periods.

The rolling renewal will continue until either side notifies the other of its intention not to extend.

[Press Release]

Sirius Satellite Radio Inc. chief Mel Karmazin earned himself a comfortable $32.2 million in 2007, according to the company's recent SEC 10-K/A filing. That's $2 million more than XM's executive management team, combined.

While Karmazin's base salary of $1.25 million did not change in 2007, the company awarded its CEO an $4 million bonus. The year prior, the company awarded Karmazin a $3 million bonus.

Add in other compensations, stock awards and option awards last year, and his total compensation package tops out over $32.21 million.

Compare this to XM Radio's entire executive management team - which includes the compensation paid to former-CEO Hugh Panero - and Mel Karmazin beats their combined total by $2.3 million.

[Form 10-K/A]

Stilllll going! Just when you thought we had reached a lull in the meetings at the Federal Communications Commission, along comes American Public Media to keep the fire burning.

Rick Chessen, Senior Legal Advisor to Commissioner Copps, and representatives for American Public Media met on Monday to discuss a letter (PDF) it sent to the FCC last week. Yes, that's right, a letter sent late last week deserves a meeting.

The non-profit organization reiterated its letter (you think?) urging the FCC to require that Sirius Satellite Radio Inc. and XM Satellite Radio Holdings Inc. hand over 20% of its combined spectrum for "for non-commercial educational use."

[View Filing (PDF)]

According to FORTUNE, the upcoming 3G iPhone will be discounted by AT&T to bring the price of the device down to $200.

Citing a "person familiar with the strategy," AT&T is preparing to subsidize $200 of the cost of a new iPhone for customers who sign two-year contracts.

Additionally, they say the new iPhone will be 2.5mm thinner than the original and will have a built-in GPS chip for navigation and other location-based services.

The New York Times' Bits Blog sees several holes in this rumor, especially the claim that the subsidized iPhone would be offered in AT&T stores exclusively, and not Apple stores. Still, it's an inevitable part of Apple's strategy to drastically lower the iPhone's price to bring sales closer to critical mass, with or without any fabled "person" to provide the info.

[FORTUNE via Engadget Mobile]

While speculation abounds about whether the upcoming Sirius Starmate 5 will have the capability to receive both Sirius and XM, there's one piece of the puzzle that was missed... the ability to receive A La Carte channels.

As a refresher: Sirius-XM have said that after merging, they would offer the first-ever a la carte packages in subscription media. These packages would allow subscribers to choose 50 channels for $6.99/month, or 100 channels from either Sirius or XM for $14.99/month. Additional channels would cost $0.25/each.

But a commenter on SiriusBuzz points to the Starmate 5's user manual, which gives a strong indication that this radio could indeed be the first A La Carte capable unit.

The section in question, Page 74 of the user manual (PDF), refers to the "My Channels" category, which "will show all of the channels contained in your SIRIUS subscription plan." The Starmate 5 user manual then goes on to describe that the "category heading bar will show the total number of channels your Starmate ST5 is subscribed to."

The manual also differentiates these subscribed channels from channels that are locked by the built-in Parental Control feature (which has been available on previous generations).

Below are select bullet points from the manual highlighting this:

• "If you try to tune to an unsubscribed channel the ST5 will display a 'Channel Unsubscribed' message."
• "The ST5 will not display channel information for any unsubscribed or locked channels."
• "The Memory and Song Seek functions... will only occur on subscribed channels."

Now, before we get all in a tizzy, it is also important to point out that the "My Channels" references in the Starmate 5's manual could be referencing the "select" packages and not true "a la carte" packages. As you can see in Sirius' post-merger channel lineup, there are  other programming packages that would limit the number of channels displayed on the unit, including a "Family Friendly" package, a "Mostly Music" package and a "News, Sports & Talk" package.

Even if that's the case, I still think this is an important development.

[via Orbitcast Forums]

Former President Jimmy Carter sat down for an interview on Sirius Satellite Radio to discuss his recent peace mission to the Middle East, among other topics, with Sirius host Alex Bennett.

Carter also talked about the current democratic presidential primary and his new book A Remarkable Mother about the life and legacy of his mother, Lillian Carter.

In addition, the former President discussed his controversial meeting with Hamas.

"We got what we wanted from Hamas. They agreed to a lot of very important things," said former President Jimmy Carter during the interview. "First of all they agreed to propose a cease fire just for Gaza, where as before they [Hamas] were demanding Gaza plus a West Bank. So they made that proposal, unfortunately Israel turned the proposal down, which could have stopped the rockets going into Sderot and could have brought peace."

President Carter's also added his thoughts on how he believes the Democratic presidential primaries will be resolved.

"I feel after June the 3rd, there will be a fairly clear identity of the winner," said Carter. "And then, in my opinion, the super delegates including me will go along the way the American democrats have."

You can hear Alex Bennett, a self-proclaimed radio gadfly, on "The Alex Bennett Program" weekdays from 9 - 12pm ET on Sirius Left (ch 146).

An analysis of a regulatory filing by the Associated Press has revealed that XM Satellite Radio Holdings Inc. CEO Nate Davis received a cool $4.85 million in compensation last year.

Davis received a salary of $560,416, plus $747,500 in nonequity incentive-based compensation in 2007, according to the SEC filing. In addition, he also received stock awards valued at $3.54 million.

By comparison, XM's former-CEO Hugh Panero received a compensation valued at $3.71 million including $3.075 million in stock awards in 2006. Then in 2007, Panero received compensation valued at $7.27 million, including $538,522 in salary, a severance payment of $4.95 million and stock awards of $1.77 million.

[AP]

XM's original comedy series "Unmasked" will be returning for a new season on May 3rd with comedic legends such as Lewis Black, Margaret Cho, Janeane Garofalo and The Kids in the Hall.

Recorded before a live studio audience, "Unmasked" offers up candid, one-on-one interviews with comedic talent for an uncensored look into their creative process and the lives that shape their comedy. "Unmasked" originally launched in September with George Carlin as its inaugural guest.

Lewis Black (pictured) will kick off the 2nd season, sharing stories of his early, broke years working in the theatre, and the night he spent in jail. Then every two weeks a new episode will air, with Marget Cho (May 17), The Kids in the Hall (May 31) and Janeane Garofalo (June 14) in the queue.

The season premieres on Saturday, May 3 at 8pm ET/5pm PT on XM Comedy (ch 150).

Click the jump to see a photo of Lewis Black with XM's EVP of Programming, Eric Logan.

"When the only tool you have is a hammer, then every problem begins to look like a nail."

- Abraham Maslow

In the world of statistics and research, methodology is paramount. That's pretty basic. If you're going to draw a conclusion from the polling of a sample, the methods you use to extract those answers had damn well better be solid. Because in the end, the way this data is gathered defines the final outcome.

And this is exactly why I say that the Arbitron ratings for satellite radio listening are wrong. Indeed, they're bullshit.

Maybe that was a bit harsh, I'm sorry. Let's instead say that these ratings are for "information purposes only," because that's how Arbitron refers to them.

Mind you, the criticism that's about to ensue has absolutely nothing to do with terrestrial radio and how its listenership is measured. That's a whole different issue. This is meant to point out the flaws in how Arbitron measures satellite radio listenership and nothing more. So when I say that "Arbitron's ratings are wrong" I mean for Sirius and XM, and not regular radio.

So let's begin.



Reason #1
The Arbitron Diary.

Actually, it's the methodology for terrestrial radio ratings that's screwing it all up. Arbitron's diary is built from the ground up to measure AM/FM. Not Internet Radio. Not Satellite Radio. Not even HD Radio (that is, if anyone was listening to HD Radio). It's meant for good ol' regular radio and nothing else.

Here's a big problem: There is no checkbox for a listener to select "Satellite Radio." None. Nothing for Sirius. Nothing for XM. Nothing. Diarykeepers need to actually physically write in the service and the channel info, in addition to the time they started and stopped listening to the program as well as the location of where they did this. Do you think people will actually write in all that information? Right there, the data becomes tainted.

Follow the jump to keep reading...