The Merger of XM and Sirius
I have been a subscriber to XM for about 2 years or so. The biggest draw to XM was being able to listen to the Yankees (which I don't get the luxury of watching anymore since I moved to Massachusetts) and the Opie and Anthony Show. I have also come to love the ol school rap channel (takes me back to the good ol days of rap) and the hardcore metal channel. For a while there have been rumors of a merger for the past year or so and now on Monday it officially is going through the motions. I know that it will take at least a year for the deal to go through, if it goes through at all. I just hope that the consumers don't lose out in the long run by either higher subscriptions or loss of programming specificly with the baseball package and O&A.
The baseball package I am not too concerned about because it is a huge draw that I'm sure both camps would agree to keep. Opie and Anthony on the other hand is another story especially because Mel Karmazin (Howard Stern's boss on regular radio and Sirius) will be the head of this "new" company and he HATES O&A. Now before you label me as a Howard Stern hater, I used to be a huge Howard fan. I am from NY and I used to listen to him way back since junior high school. I have both books and own the movie Private Parts. I even remember the old channel 9 show that ran on Friday nights where every 5 minutes he would do an ad for Snapple. Over the last few years of Howard on regular radio, I feel the show kinda lost it's edge and Howard became too much of a celebrity. His interviews became boring and everyone on that show grew a huge ego. While I was dating my wife and travelling to Boston on Friday afternoons, I started listening to O&A and became a huge fan of them. There were many times I almost crashed my car on 95/128 from laughing so hard. So when the whole satellite choice came about, I chose XM over Sirius.
Anyway I just hope the choice of programming becomes more of a buisness decision then grudges and politics. Hopefully they can figure out a way to give the listeners a choice of more programming rather then taking content away. Maybe a way to choose from a handful of "premium programming" channels on top of the newly integrated music channels. Cause if I can get Baseball, O&A and Howard, then I would be a very happy camper and would even consider paying a couple extra bucks a month. I just don't think it will work out that way. Too much money and politics involved. Only time will tell I guess. I'm babbling so I'll stop now.
Peace.