Slacker now available on Blackberry Storm

Slacker is taking over and Satellite radio is dying, OK Slacker doesn't have news, well it's all bad anyway. Slacker has a play list that satellite radio could never hope to touch, so if you are about music, Slacker is it.Slacker doesn't have the insane overhead that satellite radio does, so that is one big advantage it has over satellite radio which has no chance of seeing a profit.

Rock on Slacker!!!!!

I agree. I've been a staunch supporter of Satrad and an XM sub for 5+ years now. But charging for online is the final straw for me. I turned on multiple coworkers by letting them use my online sub to listen and they are now paying subs. But they are going to lose the online feature that they have enjoyed. I am using a Slacker G1 and enjoying that a lot. I think they are going to start using the Slacker website to listen online at work and I wouldn't be surprised to see them drop their subs for a Slacker subscription in the near future. SiriusXM is on the cusp of losing my two accounts. Adding free features like Storm access is another example of how a company catering to its customers is taking subs from a company who is abandoning everything that it once stood for and provided. I know the satrad apologists will pile in here, but I can no longer justify $27.98/month for my two subs which are currently $18.95 for no appreciable gain in service.

Yeah, Slacker doesn't do news, but I found it just as easy to have iTunes grab the CNN and/or Fox hourly news updates (same you head on terrestrial radio, but as a podcast) and stick those on my iPod. Can get all the news on the way to work, and refresh them using a hotspot at work. Besides, I can get just the big stories, without listening to ten minues on Caylee Anthony or pundits arguing.

If you could take the bright lights running Slacker and given them to SirXM, there might actually be hope. Otherwise, unlikely

Is air time free while listening to slacker or Sirius-XM for that matter on a cell phone?

SiriXM streams it, meaning you are going to need a data package and will stream it constantly to your phone when you use the system.

Slacker uses streaming and queuing. It can stream right to your phone, or if you designate space on your phone, it can preload content onto your phone. Then you are not online to use the service and acquiring additional data use, or unable to use the service when you have little or no cellular service. But I believe it depends how you setup your smartphone to stream/preload content as to how much, if any space it can store music on.

Good question about the air time. Another question I had about the mobile applications involves the claim that 'your favorite music is available wherever you go'. Is it really that relaible? Can you easily hook it up to your vehicle, get solid reception and record you favorite music at the touch of a button? Unless is does, I'd say Sirius still has advantages. Big advantages! I don't use the online service and only listen to satrad in my car. The price increase doesn't bother me as a subscriber and makes me feel a little better about my investment as a stockholder. There's still a lot of value for what you get, even compared to free. I just got back from a snowboarding trip with three budies who have ipods/iphones. Try getting consistent cell phone coverage on a trip through Kansas and the Rockies on I-70. Doesn't happen. While everyone wanted to play their toys through my car stereo, my stiletto was the main source of entertainment on the way their and the ride home. Not just because it was my car, it was their call. They loved the different music stations, the talk stations, Howard, and even the playboy radio... Let's face it. If Mel can get the debt figured out, and most insiders feel he will, Sirius will survive and prosper. The Stock market has taken a big dump twice this week, dropping over 100 points each time and SIRI has grown a little since last week and held it's ground (what little it has left) when the rest of the market went down in big numbers. This is with the Debt issue sitting in the final days! I bought more stock when it went down a month ago and more last week when it was at .11 a share. I guess we'll see what happens next...

I still enjoy LIVE radio. I DO listen to free online radio on my cellphone. But LOVE XM!! I never cared for Slacker. The whole recorded station thing is nuts. Oh well.

Actually the caching capability is only available on Blackberry units. If you have an iPhone it streams, but does not load your phone with the data in advance. So while it takes up less space on the iPhone, the Blackberry app allows it to run down your battery less and use it in places you don't get a good cellphone signal.

Don't you have to have a special data package on most of these phones , to get the music , and not just use your minutes ?

Can someone tell me what Slacker has to do with satellite radio?

Its funny how we have all these slacker fanboys on here. Basically, Slacker is just a massive jukebox that allows you to listen to any song any time. Wow (yawn), that's really exciting.

No you have to pay a monthly fee for the data download package.

What does that cost?

20.00 - 30.00 a month or more!

Sounds like a great deal. right!

Slacker's a lacker. Compare it to Sirius-Xm...LOL! It doesn't even belong in the same genre. I hate the way all these 2 bit passing music capture device fads try to capitalize on Sirius-Xm's success. There really is no valid comparison to make here.

re : data plans

these apps are for blackberrys and iphones, whcih outside of the app require a data plan. Therefore, claiming the data plan of $25-$30 a month costs more than an XM sub is not a fair comparison since that fee is part of the phone regardless if you use Slacker or not. If anything, Slacker adds to the validity of paying for a data plan.

Also, that $30 plan doesn't just give you a source of streaming media. It gives you email and internet, neither of which is given to you by an XM sub.

Don't hate on Slacker because satellite radio sucks, hate on Mel and his cronies for not keeping the product competitive and the content desireable.

SatRad fanboys trying to spoil our slacker fun because SatRad is dying.LOL

I'd be a Slacker "fanboy" as well, IF they offered a decent in-car dock. If that were the case, I'd definitely drop my XM subscription down to the $9.95 sports and news option and just use Slacker for the music. I absolutely love the $3.99 Slacker Plus service (XM no longer offers punk and ska, but it's readily available on Slacker). It sucks that I can't cache on my iPod Touch, but hopefully that will be a feature added someday.

wow, I am going to get slacker in my Car..Can I? I would love to listen to Howard and CNN while driving back from work..

Can someone explain to me how Slacker gets around royalties because they have to pay them like everyone else. And the fact that they are pushing saved content to the phone is an additional fee above just streaming it. How do they get away with this?

I havent listen to Sirius in weeks, ever since they removed Cinemagic and Pop2K from Sirius. The past 2 days I have been using Slacker on my iPhone and online. I have a strong feeling that I will canceling my Sirius.

i think the slacker lovers (like myself) vs. the slacker haters could possibly be a generational thing.

i just don't get the "its too much work" argument...if you're already reading a blog and commenting on said blog than you can figure out how to use the internet and slacker. You don't give yourselves enough credit, its not rocket science....

the data plan is for MUCH more than Slacker. Very important for business professionals as well as people under 30. In fact I mostly use my phone as an internet device rather than a phone...I have the lowest minute family plan and as a family we barely use half of the mins each month because we mostly talk to each other and people on the same network plus we mainly call at night, i think our account has something like 1,000 rollover minutes....

for someone faulting it because its not "live"....who cares, its music... Regular radio and Sat Radio aren't live either when it comes to music-its called voice-tracking.

For music, its much better than just about any other option for radio, Satrad included......I guess for people who grew up in the 60's and 70's repetitive playlists and annoying DJ's "talking up" a song while its playing is just par for the course so they don't mind it as much....But for me, this is completely unacceptable.

i hate to bash satrad on a satrad blog, but at this point in this economy, unless you spend a TON of time in the car (like a trucker or someone with a multi-hour commute) and are a HUGE sports junky, I don't see the value in Satrad for music anymore when their are viable alternatives like Slacker that are much better and much cheaper (as in free or $44/year for ad free)

LOL

Google search for slacker will bring up this sight, so no wonder it attracts the NAB satellite radio bashers and Slackers.

The best is Mac boy who conveniently chooses to say he hasn't listened to Sirius because they got rid of Cinemagic and Pop2K - just happens to be the 2 stations that were replaced by popular demand channels Strobe& Backspin.

There are 2 bashers with 3 screen names each here.

Get FlyCast for live news. My Storm to Slacker: "You complete me."

Actually, that's not true. Anyone know how to stream the MLB Gameday Audio to the Storm? 2 months to go.

As somebody who actually sells cellphones, I can tell you that data package is required to own a Blackberry or iPhone. That is the only two products that Slacker is on. Its also the exact same data package you have to have to use Sirius XMs iPhone or BB app. The only difference is, come March you will have to pay $2.99/month extra for the right to use the online service with Sirius XM.

Slacker has been nothing but a pain in the ass to me.It crashes every other day, the manual doesn't tell you how to restart, it's a lot of work to keep banning and favoriting songs so that Slacker's idiotic song selection process doesn't fill my stations with crap.etc. Forget Slacker. For 199$ (the cost of the Slacker portable), you can get an Ipod touch or a year's worth of XM plus money to spare. Slacker is not ready for prime time!

Slacker does pay royalties, and has some - though minimal - advertising. I bought a G2 and love it. In my life, the only thing that keeps satrad valuable is the talk...and I wonder each day if that even has any value......

If that $199 is steep, then consider that Inno, Helix, Stilleto were that price or more when they debuted. And both had major issues as well, esp. with the touted claim of listening live on the go. My Inno doesn't pick up for shit when I'm running or working in my yard, and just becomes a heavy MP3 player when its not on the dock.

I bought my G1 brand new for $50 last week to test out the service (I bought my Inno on Woot for like $70 last year because I refuse to pay that massive initial markup) I downloaded the newest firmware that came out last week and the thing runs fine. It auto refreshes my stations when I'm in my work wireless network or at home on my Linksys. No issues to complain about for me once the firmware update was on. No experience on the G2, but I will probably upgrade once I catch one on a deal and give the G1 to my wife.

I have slacker on my Curve, but I still listen to XM more- reason being the quality of the programming, especially music. There is a LOT of repetition on Slacker, in least IMHO.

Slacker haters = satellite radio newbs and suckers

Since the announcement that Sirius XM was going to start charging for online service, (Um, why would I pay for this, when there are about ten thousand free online radio sites?) I've been trying out Slacker. I really like it. I like it a lot. Now that the player is becoming available on phones and other portable devices, I just might be switching, and soon. One less gadget to carry is always a plus. For 4 dollars a month, I can get commercial free, DJ free music on multiple devices. (Why am I paying 20+ dollars a month for 2 XM radios?)

So while it takes up less space on the iPhone, the Blackberry app allows it to run down your battery less and use it in places you don't get a good cellphone signal.

Pros: It has almost everything someone would want. My 4 year old loves the touch screen for websites that allow him to interact (ex fisher price website). Mine came with Windows vista, and I've been waiting for my windows 7 upgrade for 2 months now, hope to see it soon. Screen is bright, touch screen is great, finger print id is awesome, and computer is fast once you remove the bloat software HP installs.