In a duopoly, such as that in the satellite radio industry, it's a given that the media will do a "versus" comparison from time to time... many of which I ignore. They're usually the same crap and ultimately give you a wishy-washy conclusion ("if you like Howard Stern, go with Sirius - but if you like Oprah, go with XM!" yeah, great, thanks).

But this beauty on Associated Content caught my eye. First off, I should at least applaud the author for making a choice (Sirius won) - and the comparison is based on personal experience - but there's a few holes and I'm going to exploit here. So let's get to it shall we?

"XM has a bad habit of repeating songs. I may end up hearing one song five times in one day within a few hours period. With Sirius, that isn’t the case."

...has anyone experienced this? Maybe I'm listening to different channels than this author.

"Furthermore, I do not like the way XM names its stations."

...ok, I need to agree here. While cute, many of the channels are just too ambigious for the newbie to instantly know what kind of music is being played. But that's also what the neighborhoods are for - if you're in the Rock neighborhood, you kind of know what you're going to get (take a guess... Rock, good job). That said, Sirius isn't necessary innocent of this either. "Buzzsaw" and "Area 33" are really self-explainitory either. But aside from all that... is this really friggin big deal?

"Sirius satellite radio broadcasts a lot clearer than XM, especially in relation to the talk channels. People’s voices come across a lot smoother and can be easier understood than XM, which tends to be fuzzy."

...huh? Bandwidth - and subsequently sound quality - varies from channel to channel. I wonder if she's comparing a traffic channel to Howard 100. There's crappy sounding talk channels on both services. Sorry, that's the truth.

"It’s true that XM has 90+ music channels, 10+ sports channels, 20+ news and talk channels, along with a few traffic channels."

...90+ eh? Try 69.

"Along the same lines, if you will be doing a lot of listening to talk shows, Sirius has more of the popular shows such as “Discovery,” “Howard Stern,” and “Martha Stewart.” What celebrity talk show does XM have? The “Oprah Winfrey“ show. Sirius also has “Playboy Radio.” What does XM have that could compete with that? Nothing."

...she counts "Discovery" as a popular show? Nothing about HGTV or Food Network on XM? What about Dale Earnhart Jr? Jimmie Johnson? Ellen Degeneres? Cal Ripken Jr? Tyra Banks? Oprah's not even on yet!

If you're going to do a comparison, at least do a bit of research. Basing it on personal preference is fine - hell, that's the deciding factor for everyone - just try and give it a fair shake though. Want my bottom line? Fine, here it is: if you like Howard Stern, go with Sirius - but if you like Oprah, then go with XM.

[Associated Content]