The Arbitron ratings have really caused a stir, which is not surprising since this is the first time we've seen any public ratings of any kind for Sirius and XM.

And of course, usual suspects are jumping all over it. This from Inside Radio:

Howard Stern then: 20 million listeners. Today: 1,225,100.
That's Stern's weekly cume according to Arbitron's first-ever report detailing listening to XM and Sirius. It shows his $500 million contract with Sirius buys the company an average 96,700 listeners in any given quarter hour. While his audience is just a fraction of what it once was, his "Howard 100" channel is satellite radio's top-rated, delivering more listeners than any other channel.

Now I'm not going to say it's "unfair" to compare satellite radio ratings with terrestrial ratings, but I am going to say that the comparison is useless. It's not about listeners, it's about subscribers.

That's part of the benefit of satellite radio. Not being dependent on ratings and constantly trying to boost your cume/AQH/TSL gives broadcasters artistic freedom and allows them to drop the gimmicks. That's part of the reason why the best broadcasters from terrestrial have made the jump to satellite.

And that's part of reason why we all subscribe, because the B.S. of regular radio - which is ultimately meant to drive ratings - is not prevalent on satellite radio.

Howard Stern still tops the most popular talk radio personalities, based on Internet searches, for the 7th straight year. But coming in at number three, are Opie & Anthony, generating four times more search interest than this time last year.

...that is, according to Lycos.

And apparently some people still do use the aging search engine because, Lycos has just come out with the The Lycos 50 which is used to formulate the "The Lycos Top Talk Radio Hosts of 2007" (a list, that for the life of me, I simply cannot find... which might be a clue as to why Lycos isn't popular anymore? Anyway, I guess we can depend on the press release for this one).

What was I saying? Oh right. Stern's search activity increased 44% since making the move from terrestrial radio to Sirius in 2006, while Tom Joyner takes the number two spot on this year's list, more than doubling in search popularity over the past year.

But shock jocks Opie & Anthony, rank as #3 and are the biggest movers and shakers with web users in 2007, generating four times more search interest than this time last year.

See Lycos' full ranking of all talkers for 2007 after the jump...

Now, ignoring what Lycos is telling us in a fluffy PR, let's see what Google says about online popularity and rankings for talkers:

Here's the Top 4 from Lycos' list, according to Google Trends. Howard Stern remains as the leader, followed by Rush Limbaugh, Opie & Anthony, and then Tom Joyner.

But wait... wasn't there a big stink about a certain talker who scandalously mentioned the words "nappy headed hoes" on the air? Oh right, Imus. So let's add him to the chart:

According to Google Trends, Howard Stern remains in the number one slot, followed by Rush Limbaugh, then Imus (narrowly), Opie & Anthony and finally, Tom Joyner.

Oddly, according to the Lycos press release, "the controversy and subsequent firing of Don Imus failed to boost significant online interest for Imus in 2007, with his search numbers cut in half."

Funny, that's not what a real search engine is showing... ah well, long live fluffy PR.