Seems like an honest survey...I'm sue some good will come out of this merger (like amazing hardware) but this survey shows the concerns many have. I guess with more info. alot of us including myself will be more at ease.

i'd prefer to hear from a non-partisan research group. its like asking what the nab thinks of this deal. overall, this merger could keep an industry going strong that millions have chosen and enjoy, and will put them in a better position to compete with other media.

What no O&A, Ophra, MLB, Martha, Nascar, Ect poll??

Guess they are not important...

giggle giggle

By "if he were offered on XM, free of charge" I assume they mean "without having to pay more than the $12.95 you already pay." If anyone asked me I would definitely say I'd be "very likely" to take something they were giving away for free. In the end, however, free crap is still crap.

Okay, I know there's some bitterness between subscribers of the two companies, but come on. 88% of XM subscribers won't listen to Stern if it's free to them? I highly doubt that. If 30,000 people made the move to XM for O&A, what do the other 6 million people do for morning talk? Given Stern's nationally syndicated ratings on terrestrial radio I imagine he'll gain more than 12% of XM listeners if the merge happens.

"...what do the other 6 million people do for morning talk?"

Did you ever consider that there are people out there who don't want to listen to talk in the morning and would rather listen to news or music?

1010 WINS in NYC is always one of the highest rated stations and all they do is news, traffic, and weather. And I know women who prefer to listen to music rather than any talk show.

- If 30,000 people made the move to XM for O&A, what do the other 6 million people do for morning talk? -

The "bitterness" comes partially from mis-information such as the above. First off, the exact numbers of how many people payed $1.99 for O&A initially have never been released. The 30,000 number comes from Howie, and even if that's what it was - given the initial number of XM subscribers and the fact they'd been gone for 2 years it's actually not that bad.

Far more people are listening to them now on XM than 30,000. Just ask Directv, who had the biggest response they've ever had when they dropped the show - it was back on in a week. XM brass have stated in the past they are one of the top shows on the service.

The low number of people who'll listen makes sense when considering anyone who wants Stern probably already has Sirius. I'd like to see a poll asking XM subscribers if they'll cancel if A: Their favorite station is gone in favor of a Sirius replacement and B: If Opie and Anthony leave/get pushed out because precious Howie can't stand having competition (and he'll have Mel to save him again.) I've never outright "hated" Stern but if this merger goes through and f**ks up XM for me I'll certainly start to. Not to mention XM for participating in the screw job. But of course I'm supposed to smile and think about all the wonderful "benefits" this merger will bring, right Ryan? And if I cancel it's not because my service has changed and I'm protesting with my dollar but because I'm "cheap" or don't have a job - according to some of the kool-aid drinkers here.

As for XM morning shows, there are several others on XM people can already listen to.

"88% of XM subscribers won't listen to Stern if it's free to them? I highly doubt that. If 30,000 people made the move to XM for O&A, what do the other 6 million people do for morning talk? Given Stern's nationally syndicated ratings on terrestrial radio I imagine he'll gain more than 12% of XM listeners if the merge happens."

marcDCX, I don't know how you can feel so confident about what you said. Consider that subscribers to XM already pay 13/mo. If they really wanted to listen to Stern, why wouldn't they just cancel XM and switch to Sirius? I think this 88/12 is realistic. Here's another point to consider. When Stern made his announcement in Oct 2004, XM has approx 2.5 mil subs. Today they are over 7.6 mil, so since his announcement over 5 million subs came onboard who could have bought Sirius for Stern and didn't.

if opie and anthony were big on xm , they would still be at 1.99.
if opie and anthony were big on xm , xm would never let them go to free fm.

quit blaming o/a problems on howie and mel. they never had the balls to stand up to howie so they went after his kid and if you go after someones kid they will come back at you.

mel didn't tell those two idiots have sex in a church. and it was mel that honored the contract with o/a they were paid for their time off.

this is about sat.radio if you pests feel that hoo hoo will destroy sat. radio cancel. you'll be missing out on something great and not just stern.

"if opie and anthony were big on xm , they would still be at 1.99.
if opie and anthony were big on xm , xm would never let them go to free fm.

quit blaming o/a problems on howie and mel. they never had the balls to stand up to howie so they went after his kid and if you go after someones kid they will come back at you."

You sir, really need to be educated on the facts and not what Howie and SFN drones tell you. Are they big on XM? They are the biggest. Fact. They never had the balls to stand up to Howie? They did....it was Howie who didn't have the balls and kept them from talking about him. Thats having balls? And before you say "oh..its because they talked about his daughter" do research and see that the one time they talked about her was well after Howie already started F'ing with their show.

Face facts, OnA are to XM what Howie is to Sirius...their biggest show. having both on the same platform will be big for the company, as long as Mel and Howie can be honest with themselves and not the hypocrites they have shown to be in the past and not kick them off out of spite. Because it'd be a very bad business decision seeing as they pull just as many listeners as Howie does on satellite alone.

I'm not talking about anything else besides the gag order. Let's see Stern be a man and go head to head with Opie and Anthony mornings on the new platform instead of hiding behind Mel again.

They certainly do not believe they'll be allowed the same freedoms they've had at XM if the two companies merge. Lee Abrams last blog post also alludes to the fact that change at the top could F up everything he's worked to build musically at XM. What I subscribe to XM for is clearly at risk if this merger goes through. That is why I'm against it.

P.S. - Opie and Anthony NEVER wanted to be an additional $1.99 charge on XM. Do you have some insight into what the management was thinking 2 years ago you'd like to offer us? It has been said that both O&A and the Playboy channel were "premium" because the suits were too scared that Sally soccer-mom might come upon them and become uber-offended.

As for the Free FM deal - it's hurt FM more than XM. I think it was Panero who was saying there was a noticable jump in people subscribing specifically for O&A after they went on FM. It's an ad for XM, they mention it ALOT during the broadcast. Many fans wouldn't mind if the show was sat-only again, but thanks to this merger it may go the other way.

This is an arguement that will never end between Opie & Anthony and Howard Stern fans. I personally think Stern is beyond awful and Opie & Anthony are bad. SO I guess Opie & Anthony would win in my opinion but they both suck.

"Let's see Stern be a man and go head to head with Opie and Anthony mornings on the new platform instead of hiding behind Mel again."

Ok, I've stayed out of the "vs" stuff lately but why would O and A want to go head to head with stern, They can't get A 2 rating on reg. radio with him gone. Why not try for afternoons, you don't have A 500 mill superstar already in the same spot. I would say that 95% of Sirius subs outside of NY have never even heard OandA's show. I only know of the show because of the pests that trash Howard. I am not alone in being Howard fan but have never really got Bubba. Could give the show a shot if the pests keep their mouths shut in coming months. Why piss off all the possible new listeners with all the retarded "HOO HOO" crap. Might be able to follow Jim Burier or something like that, I have read that O and A are friends with him.

I'm amazed at how deluded O&A fans are to actually think that those two second-rate copycat hacks deserve to even be mentioned in the same sentence with the legendary Howard Stern. They are nobodies.

Head to head, Stern would destroy them utterly. His show is 1000 times more entertaining than those stupid "Frank the Frowner" and "Fatty Pig Fatty" bits.

mel didn't tell those two idiots have sex in a church. and it was mel that honored the contract with o/a they were paid for their time off.

Mel/Viacom didn't honor their contract, they chose to not fire them. Had they been fired they could've signed with another company, but instead Viacom chose to not air their show. Not having O&A on the radio - anywhere - after that incident mollified the Catholic League and helped the press die down faster. It wasn't because Mel was a nice guy, it was because it was cheaper to pay their contract than deal with the negative press.

The ol' Spin Machine is strong within this topic.
If Howard Stern was airing right now on my Inno. A replay since its friday, i wouldnt listen. I would rather turn on the Gleen and Rebecca Show or something just as shitty.

Soon enough we will have bigger problems than show vs. show.

Opie and Dopie get bad ratings on FM. FACT!

They *could be the most listened to station on XM but nobody can claim they could pull in anything near what Howard does.

If you're talking compensation you're correct but sorry, they have more listeners than old man Stern. Fact.

I'm a big howard fan, and subscribed to sirius just for him, however even though thats the case, I frequently turn him off and listen to cds, my ipod, or regular radio. I'm going to assume that other people do the same, and don't listen to every minute of the same show every day. So with the ability to get Howard's show at no extra cost, I'd be pretty shocked if more than 12% of XM audience wouldn't at least casually check his show out.

I don't hate O&A, but am definitely not a fan either. and even I occasionally turn their freefm show on just to see whats up, but I quickly get tired of all the commercials..

PFreak show us YOUR facts. I probably believe you but just stating fact does not make it so. Hell General Motors said that the Hummer H1 gets less than 10miles per gallon when in FACT the H1 got more mpg than an H2. Sorry for going off topic BUT it was an easy comparison.

wander118 said, "I frequently turn him off and listen to cds, my ipod, or regular radio. I'm going to assume that other people do the same, and don't listen to every minute of the same show every day." I wouldn't not assume anything if I were you. A lot of fans (I would say the majority) might not listen to Stern all day BUT turning on another channel is probably a safer bet than to turn on an MP3 player or listen to CD's. That might get you buy but I pay $13 a month and try to get all that I can get out of it.

- Ok, I've stayed out of the "vs" stuff lately but why would O and A want to go head to head with stern, They can't get A 2 rating on reg. radio with him gone -

Yea, it's all about daddy Howie. How did they even go to satellite without him? Stern wouldn't get the ratings he used to either (he wasn't when he left) in 2007, unless he started speaking spanish. Terrestrial sucks. We know this - that's why we're here. America is pretty much full of idiots, so it goes without saying that anything outside of the cookie-cutter morning zoo crap on 99% of radio will be a tough sell. They've banned the N word in NYC and these guys are making rape and cancer jokes. The people who get it, get it. Everyone else can fuck off. They've tried to be themselves without compromising the show. And FM in general is falling apart, with major companies selling off stations left and right. It's sucked for too long, and the people are gone.

- Why not try for afternoons, you don't have A 500 mill superstar already in the same spot. -

Who knows if they'll both be in the same tier package? Maybe their over-all listenership could go down if they are not included by default and you need to pay extra for them. And O&A would still need their own channel, and replay in the afternoon anyway. They actually prefer afternoons, it was XM that wanted them in morning drive. But I'd prefer they both stay on in mornings (they'd have to if they keep the FM deal) and anyone could catch either shows replay whenever.

- I only know of the show because of the pests that trash Howard. -

Yea, because Howie-heads don't call O&A (especially Fridays) and try to get a circa-'95 "Bababooey" on the air week after week? The difference is they actually put them right on and let them talk. Howard's precious ego can't handle the equivalent.

- Could give the show a shot if the pests keep their mouths shut in coming months. -

You not have a show to give a "shot" if it isn't included in whatever package they are going to throw together. No show may actually get more listeners, if they aren't default on the service like they both are right now.

- I'm amazed at how deluded O&A fans are to actually think that those two second-rate copycat hacks deserve to even be mentioned in the same sentence with the legendary Howard Stern. They are nobodies. -

David Lee Roth is a "legend" too. It's all relative.

- Head to head, Stern would destroy them utterly. His show is 1000 times more entertaining than those stupid "Frank the Frowner" and "Fatty Pig Fatty" bits. -

But we'll never know, will we? If he'd "destroy" them, why is he joking with Mel about canceling the show outright? Is he scared? I don't think all of O&A's stuff is great, but it's better than listening to Howard, Howard's ego and his ass-kissing staff. I even downloaded the Stern year-end rap up show when O&A were on vaca and my co-workers agreed we're not missing much.

- They *could be the most listened to station on XM but nobody can claim they could pull in anything near what Howard does. -

Why not? Because Howard says so? Between FM/XM/Directv and the internet, they have enough fans to be on Letterman, Leno, and be doing an even larger Arena comedy tour again this summer. They have more fans than you think.

If xm gets howard stern, i will DEFINITELY listen to it. I wanted a sirius system, but $39 for the nexus 25 was the kicker.

why is it that everything we say come from howie
but yours seems to be fact when its the other way around.

go to radio and records , fmqb , ect. look up the last three books theres enough articals about their ratings
do a google search.

xm did say in the past that opie and anthony are one of the top shows on xm but never gave out actual numbers.

and quit with this the boys wanted this but so n so wanted that.

thats a pussy way out.

http://media.putfile.com/5-million

Opie and Anthony have 700,000 subscribers on XM. Pathetic.

sternfan73,
most of your posts are "the pussy way out" you paint a picture of howie that is so obviously false that a child could pick it apart. the reality is o&a aren't big enough to get enough subs and neither was howard . thats why theres a merger going on .

To Whorehay....

That clip is retarded. First of all they make a giant leap from saying its the number one show for people between the ages of 18-43.... then they claim they have over 3 million listeners who click on 202 once a week.; I'm guessing those people are clicking on 202 while trying to find something else to listen to. One more thing I found interesting.... that clip was from before the merger and they were collectively sighing relief when mr.logan suggested the merger wouldnt happen. Face is PESTS, you are all against this merger for the same reason your heros are.

bloody cape...

Do you honestly think the merger would have happened if Sirius didnt have the increase in subs for Howard?

Hey Stan, I'm on your side! I was pointing out how only a small percentage of XM subscribers listen to O&A. They have 700,000 XM listeners! If the merger happens, more former XM subscribers would be listening to Howard than O&A! Really pathetic if you think about it.

stan,
no i don't think it would and it still might not. also i am against this merger and am not a fan of o&a or howard stern (i think their both hacks, ron and fez are the only thing funny on the air). i just don't want your "hits only" music channels canceling out my "too cool for the room" music channels.