We're seeing double over an interesting rumor a reader pointed me to. Looks like XM Satellite Radio may be ramping up a buy one, get one free sales promotion.

Here's the deal:
Buy any receiver and get a Roady2 free.

The first receiver gets the regular subscription, and the Roady2 will get activated under the Family Plan ($6.99/month).

This promotion has some interesting timing as well. Expected to go from the beginning of May and will end the beginning of July. Just in time for the Pioneer XM2go AirWare release.

A faithful reader pointed out to me that XM Satellite Radio just recently had a patent approved that gives us the opportunity to take a deeper look into the upcoming time-shifting technologies to come.

Here's a snippet from the Abstract. I bolded some phrases that are of interest:

A receiver in a digital broadcast system is provided for storing broadcast content files for on-demand playback purposes. The content files are transmitted in a partitioned format. Users can select which content files are to be captured in a memory device following reception. The receiver is operable to monitor the reception of content file segments and, when a selected on-demand content file has been completely received, to generate an alert message to notify a user that the content is available for retrieval from the memory device and playback via an output device.

Very, very, very cool.

[See the whole patent here]

Here we go again! The iPod Satellite rumor continues...