I am very unhappy with Sirius and XM.

Please go away.

 

+1

 

I didn't know that about his contract. How substantial are the rumors that he will retire?

For me, when I get in the car, I start on XM 202 (the Virus) and see if Opie & Anthony are on. If Ron & Fez are on then I'll check the two Howard Stern channels for any good radio, and if Howard isn't on then I go back to Ron & Fez.

Radio will take a huge hit if Howard retires. That sucks, and I bet XM/Sirius will lose a ton of subscribers. Just looked it up, seems Stern brought a little over 2 million subscribers or so, and they have 18.5-20 million subscribers, so that's a very significant portion of their subscriber base that may unsubscribe if they can't get their Stern fix.

(Just for fun, Nintendo sold 24 million Wii's in the US and 50 million worldwide. More iPhones have been sold than Sirius subscribers, etc. But I guess it's not fair to compare sales to subscriptions.)

If I were SiriusXM I would be scouting out new talent. The few good xL talk radio channels are full of repeats.

 

Yeah, go jump in the river...

Don't you see that stern is not making that show anymore. He and his co-host are the ones who rake in all the money and accolades though. The show is done by the people around him (people on the background) that he treats like ... dirt. I'm sure if he is gone no one will miss him in a couple of months and those same people that do the show now will continue on under a different name.

As for why he is leaving, it's obvious that Sirius execs made a giant blunder by signing such a high-priced contract with him as well as with other celebs (well, it was pre-2008 and no one counted money back then, plus XM was still a competitor. It is btw part of why the company is doing so bad and their stock is in the crapper.) Also now when the merger between XM and Sirius was approved they don't really have any competition and can do anything they want (like taking away previous freebies (internet access) and raising prices for their loyal subscribers, or not signing multimillion dollar deals with talent anymore). That is why Stern is not getting signed. But does he need it? All he cares about is money, and he got $500,000,000 for his 5 year stint with Sirius. It's a lot of money. Do you know that one can buy an oil rig platform for that, so why do more... ound:

As for Sirius itself, unfortunately it's doomed. Not because of the content but because of mismanagement and bad economy. Whoever runs it can't find their own asses with two hands and the lights on. How else would you justify raising prices while the company loses content? Only a miracle would save them.

 

Glad the Nav Traffic works well in L.A. It sucks in Seattle.

 

Considering the company has yet to turn a profit, I'd say "rough times" is an understatement. It's too bad, I really enjoy the product. But if sat-rad goes away, there will be something else to take its place. It'll be interesting to see what Howard does when his contract is up. I have a feeling he'll stay on in some capacity if not to continue doing the daily morning show.

 

I did find out today that the Lifetime subscription does NOT include listening online at no charge. Rats! out:

 

I'll live. I can't rememebr the last time I listened to Sirius on the web. Although I bet if I had renewed my 2-year sibscription I would not get the web with it. I was probably just grandfathered in before they started nickel and diming.

 

I forgot to mention in my earlier post that Lifetime XM Everything is $399, Lifetime Best of Sirius is $100, VA tax was 5% ($25), and there was no music royalty fee on my invoice. I was previously told and budgeted another $60+ for the royalty fee.

 

It's not clear from the information XM sent in the mail if I will get "automatic renewal" if I sign up or not. This is a deal breaker for me, I have had trouble with companies before that keep charging things to my credit card after I cancel.

I have been using XM for a month now (since I got my car) and I would like to sign up, but not if I will have trouble canceling when my subscription is over if I choose to do so. Has anyone had any experience with this?

 

It is set up for automatic renewal, but you should not have a problem canceling it when need be. Of course I am speaking from the Sirius side. I had two Sirius radios at one point and easily canceled one subscription and it was just as easy to cancel the main one to come over to XM. I even got a refund on the amount of my subscription that was left. My friends who have had XM have not had an issue.