Satellite Plans "Sirius recognizing the superiority of geostationary satellite."

Didn't XM purchase a satellite that would be like Sirius' original plan. Personally I do not see how either service has a "bad" satellite layout. They both have their pros an cons.

Please don't bash me for saying it is hard to lock on to a moving satellite because that is crap. My car can lock on to satellites with not problem as well as my GPS can lock on to more than 3 sats without a problem, moving or not.

Even if this is "paid for by the NAB", it's still pretty accurate.

I don't understand why if a source might be backed or have some relationship with the NAB, it's considered automatically stupid. I can understand the criticism of the Senator, but just because the C3R or this study have NAB backing, it doesn't make what they say untrue.

One could question Orbitcast, since you might get free swag, and anytime the NAB complains you like to put those infantile pictures of infants on the site, rather than looking at their complaints objectively and determining if they have any merit at all.

What is the point? I dont get it. Does the NAB have enough clout to change minds?

LOL...Is anyone asking for a reason why the NAB is soo involved, if radio doesn't compete with XM and Sirius?

They just seem to go out of the way to stop this merger. I wonder why.

Yes JR because they were dead on right about sat TV.

nope no competition. Oh wait IPTV, Cable company mergers...hmmm they sure missed the boat on that one huh?

New Technology will give you options. this technology will not go away because of a monopoly. why did VOIP happen with the 200billion dollar gorillas out there?

I love their narrow view

"content providers will have to deal with one company"

Yep because none of this content went back to regular radio? Like howard stern could not go back to CBS if they offered him 100 billion dollars right? but wait radio does not compete with sat radio so NO ONE FROM SAT RADIO can ever go back to regular radio cause THEY ARE NOT THE SAME....

Yep MLB has alot to worry about beacause they are not already on the internet, TV and in every market on AM stations.

so narrow minded, makes you wonder how "impartial" they really are

According to somebody I talked to, the geostationary satellite wasn't because XM's was superior, they wanted to improve the dB wattage and improve amount of bandwidth. This couldn't fit in with the current plan of elliptical 3-satellite orbits.

I was against the merger before I was for it. The more I think about it and listen to both of my radios I am against it again. Too many uncertainties about the whole deal.

If one goes bankrupt, so be it. If they both do I can live with that as well. I like both and don't want 2 of the same thing. NAB can suck it, but I am still against the merger.

There is a "AM/FM Radio" column missing. One where (just to name a few): CBS changes its stations name to "Free FM," HD Radio is introduced with its own receivers, NAB hires lobbyists and "independant" organizations to write whitepapers in response to mergers, NAB lobby's the FCC to censor XM and Sirius, NAB complains about FM modulators, etc, etc... Where is that column?

Am I stupid? I don't get this ping-pong. I understand all the events, and yes they are accurate, but how would this influence the merger or dismissal of the merger by the fcc? I am for the merger. I want baseball and Stern on my sportster and I don't want to have to reactivate my xm radio to get it. I was a hassle having to plug in my Roady 2 to hear Air America and baseball, then having to switch back to my Visor (old radio) to hear Howard.

AIR, you are right. Sirius/XM can add that "AM/FM" column if they'd like. They may even want to say that transistor AM portable radios from the 1960s caused XM and Sirius to create portable receivers! Maybe broadcasts of baseball and boxing on free radio from the 1930's onward made satellite interested in signing sports! Perhaps the success of free-TV's Oprah and Martha Stewart made satellite interested in hiring them!

Satellite radio has its effects on free radio and vice versa. If satellite competes against free radio, then the price for sat will have to go down too, etc.

An irony is that the FCC's restrictive and arbitrary decency rulings are evidence that satellite radio offers something that free cannot offer (censor-free programming) adding even further to the notion that satellite and free radio compete. But Mel won't mention that on the floor, will he?

Nice suggestion, AIR.

They definitely compete but to be fair, they don't compete under the same set of rules. If you want to compare sat radio to FM then the FCC should regulate both. Without that regulation it's an uneven playing field. I'm against the merger because I don't think it will benefit any consumers. I also have no love for the NAB, those fuckers took my FM Mod, but to be fair, they have a point. Unless everyone competes under the same rules, there is no competition.

It's an interesting chart, but I've never won a ping-pong game by waiting 5 years to volley back. I don't think there's anything particularly compelling here. I mean, "oh my gosh! they *both* decided to up their advertising budget for the holiday season?! that's preposterous!" Who doesn't do that? I believe that most of these events would have occurred with or without the other company.

Competition

http://www1.sprintpcs.com/explore/ueContent.jsp?scTopic=beEntertained

"Whatever kind of music you're into, Sprint Power VisionSM can deliver it right to your phone. Watch interviews with your favorite artists and get the latest music news on Sprint Power View. "

- Sprint music store
- Sirius music
- Streaming Music

AND SPRINT IS NATIONWIDE

what stops Clearchannel, CBS, ect from doing this on verizon or a deal with cingular.

NOTHING.

JR: Understand that I'm not automatically calling the report stupid because they're backed by the NAB. But who's interests do you think they have in mind? If XM/Sirius hired the group, do you think the results would be different?

I take issue with "independent" reports being commissioned by organizations with an agenda. So I want to make sure to highlight that fact. That's all.

(And you don't like my crybaby pictures?)

Great response Ryan... I agree with you 100%. You must be "Edumacated."

PFreak,

The issue of competition is ear time, not audio broadcasting.

For instance, since mp3 players are much more popular than personal music players were five years ago, radio ratings have uniformly gone down. Specialty or loyalty programming on radio is the only unique draw that makes radio appealing these days. (Think Rush Limbaugh, NPR news and Spanish-language radio, for instance. They have increased radio market share - of a shrinking market - after people started carrying their music collections with them and needed less to the music that radios play for them.)

In short, mp3 players are competition, satellite radio says, because they are exclusive audio, portable entertainment. This is demonstrable by the shrinking numbers that free radio has suffered.

The only reason why I am going into this too-detailed explanation is to bring you to this final point: The FCC's regulation will not extend to portable mp3 players, satellite radio, etc. Yet these formats are directly competing with free radio: listening to one precludes listening to the other.

If you don't accept that satellite is competing with free radio because the FCC meddles in one more than the other, you'd still have to agree that satellite radio as an industry is still in competition with other portable entertainment media, including the cell phone companies who are now providing streaming video and audio to their customers.

By focusing on the NAB PR, this blog tends to show the transparency of their competitive effort, thus exposing the PR as thin and short-sighted.

The competition is far broader than NAB v satellite, though, and includes T-Mobile, Sprint, AT&T, Sony, Real, Apple, Creative Labs, and likely Microsoft.

This may not change your mind, but it may at least help you see that FCC involvement has less to do with qualifying the field of competition than you at first thought.

I agree with you but if you are to say sat radio competes with iPods, internet, FM, then it seems to me the argument is that sat radio is just another form of entertainment that also competes with television, cable, DVD's, youtube, etc.

If this is the case, then the merger is no different than the sat TV merger that was blocked. I'm sure I'm not the only one on this site that listens to sat radio more than I watch TV or go online so they definitely compete against all forms of entertainment for my free time. Given the choice I'd drop cable before sat radio.

However, the reason I enjoy it so much is not just the music but the uncencored programming, somethinhg that FM just can't offer. If FM was no longer under the eye of the FCC I don't think I would have a need for sat radio anymore. Much like I pay for HBO because I know any movie on ABC will be chopped to hell. If ABC could provide the same content w/o FCC fines, I could cancel HBO. This same reasoninng applies to phone carriers. They don't have uncencored content either.

All things being equal I say let the competition begin but if one of the participants, in this case FM radio, is crippled, it's not a fair competition.