Check out this very long and in-depth interview with Howard Stern in this week's issue of Entertainment Weekly.

Definitely a worthwhile read, where Stern talks about everything from Howard 100 News, to the Howard TV VOD service and the general evolution of the show since it's moved to SIRIUS.

Even if you're not a Howard fan, it's worth checking out just for the photos.

[Entertainment Weekly]

Thanks Tim! 

According to this Reuter's article, SIRIUS CEO Mel Karmazin said, at the Sports Business Journal's annual World Congress of Sports event, that he met with Howard Stern on Monday to try to get him to extend his term with similar pay structure.

Howard wasn't interested.

"He'll take his chances when the contract is up," said Mel Karmazin.

The only reason why I could see Howard turning down an extension of the contract would be either:

1. He's considering retirement.
2. He's waiting to see how much advertising revenue he can bring in within the 5 years.

I can't really blame him if you think about it. At the current rate of growth, why would lock in the current salary when it could be much bigger in 5 years?

Thanks Cranky Media Guy! 

[Reuters] 

Audiographics is quickly becoming one of my favorite Radio-related sites. Ken really does call it like he sees it. His latest article, Radio Industry's Use of Words About Howard Stern, features a perfectly snide and accurate look at how terrestrial twists things to be artifically positive.

Let me place two sentences side by side that describe Howard Stern and his move to Sirius. See if you react differently to each:

•  New Jacobs Study Says 70% Of Stern Listeners Stayed With Terrestrial Radio
•  New Jacobs Study Says 30% of Stern Listeners Moved To Sirius

[...] 

Perhaps, if the radio trades followed the same style word usage for Arbitron's RADAR national audience measurement service, instead of seeing the headline "Arbitron: Radio Reaches More Than 230 Million People," we'd have been witness to "Arbitron: 63 Million Persons Not Listening to Radio." 

Of course, as Get Sirius Info points out, Jacobs Media (the company who did the survey) is regularly contracted by major terrestrial radio companies... like CBS Radio.

USA Today has an interesting article about XM's latest commercial by Mullen Advertising featuring Snoop walking around the XM Studios looking for his chain. If you need a refresher you can watch the commercial spots here: Low Quality | High Quality.

The interesting thing about the article isn't really because it's about the commercial - because many of us have probably seen it at least a couple times. Instead, it's the AdTrack featurette that USA Today displays on the right that sparked my interest.

Of those surveyed, 17% "liked the ad a lot" - that's versus the 21% AdTrack average. Females tended to like it much more than males (23% vs 10% respectively) and only 12% thought the ad was effective (as opposed to the 20% AdTrack average).

I have my own personal opinion about the spot (verdit: boring) but I'm curious about everyone elses. Do you like this XM commercial, better or worse than say this one?

(And on a side note, there's this spoof Sirius commercial that would never make the air.) 

PC Magazine's Jim Louderback had a few scathing remarks about the Sirius S50. Follow this link to watch the review video.

Bottom line? He pretty much snubbed the S50 and instead getting the Sportster instead. If you really want to take the content with you, his suggestion was to buy a separate MP3 player to save the songs to.

Youch.

Sarah McBride at the Wall Street Journal gives us a little more insight into the commercials returning to 4 XM channels.

The dispute arose in early 2004, when XM decided to make its music channels commercial free. Previously, XM had run small amounts of advertising. Clear Channel, which provides XM with talk programming as well as music programming, wanted to stick with the commercials. The companies entered arbitration, with a panel ultimately deciding in favor of Clear Channel regarding its right to provide commercials on Clear Channel-programmed stations.

 (My advice to XM: add some wacky DJs to the channels and call it an "Entertainment" insead.)

Google sees the dMarc computer system as a great starting point for bringing targeted ads to radio. Eventually, Google sees the mix including satellite radio and the new digital HD radio, which requires a special receiver for listeners to get extra stations. Using the new digital receiver, Google hopes one day to target ads more precisely to the listener.