I’m not sure what took so long, but the FCC has finally agreed to allow Sirius and XM to merge into one satellite company.
I used to have XM, but I got rid of both my radios and switched to Sirius a few months ago. I decided that I would rather listen to Howard Stern in the mornings then Opie & Anthony. I felt like their show had gone down the tubes since they made the jump back to regular radio. When they weren’t going to commercial, they were complaining about other radio shows getting better ratings then them. It got boring.
Howard Stern on the other hand has been Howard Stern. He’s as great as he has ever been. In fact, he’s actually better then ever.
The music channels on Sirius are better then the music channels on XM. I find myself listening to a lot of channel 22 First Wave. They play a lot of classic alternative and new wave. I also enjoy channel 29 Punk Rock. They play nothing but new and vintage puck rock.
One of the things I don’t understand about this merger is one of the stipulations forced on Sirius and XM by the FCC. The two companies had to agree that after they merge, they will not raise prices for three years. If the government can do that with satellite radio, why can’t they do that with gas?
Kevin Huxford
/ July 26, 2008Might have to do with anti-trust concerns. Their licenses were tied to there being more than one satellite company. Theoretically, there are too many gas companies for their to be collusion that effect…ha…I’m sorry…I couldn’t even finish that sentence without laughing. ;)
Kevin Huxford
/ July 26, 2008Oh, for the record: I think their merger being approved is another sign of government siding with corporations at the expense of the consumer. As soon as that price regulation goes away, the negatives of this merger will start to show.
Schooly
/ July 26, 2008What negatives? It’s not like they were actually competing in a free and open market before this. There were only two choices.
Kevin Huxford
/ July 26, 2008Quick math quiz: which is the greater number: 1 or 2?
Two competing companies is certainly a more free and open market than one company with no competition. And trying to suggest that MP3 players are competition like some have said in defense is ludicrous.
I think a market with two competing companies would be one that was more inviting to a new competitor jumping in than one huge competitor, too. Not that it’s a market that is attractive to new entries, in general.
Bentcorner
/ July 27, 2008It’s not all that ludicrous. I never listen to terrestrial radio. In fact, in the car I commute to work in, I disconnected the antenna from the back of my car radio so I can listen to my iPod and my satellite radio without any RF interference from the crappy terrestrial radio stations in the area.
Kevin Huxford
/ July 27, 2008You’ve kind of gone to the extreme there, one that isn’t a fair example of the actual behavior of consumers in that market.
It’s a stretch to call MP3 players competition for satellite radio, IMO. DVD players aren’t considered competition for cable and satellite TV companies, that I’ve ever seen…and that’s the same level of difference in product.
Bentcorner
/ July 27, 2008Is it a stretch or is it ludicrous?
I know quite a few people that have made the switch to satellite radio. Not one single person I’ve talked to still listen to regular terrestrial radio. Why would they?
Kevin Huxford
/ July 27, 2008The two aren’t mutually exclusive. Forgive me for varying my vocabulary, but don’t try to make it out to be a misstep where I’ve started backing away from my original statement.
That’s nice…terrestrial and satellite radio…but my statement was that MP3 players aren’t legitimate competition as it applies to the idea of anti-trust laws, IMO. I don’t quite see terrestrial & satellite as competitors, as it apples to anti-trust, either, just as a cable/satellite TV provider (Cox, Comcast, Time/Warner, DirecTV) isn’t competing with NBC, CBS, ABC, etc.
Bentcorner
/ July 27, 2008Well what then is a competitor to satellite? The FCC approved the merger because they agreed with XM and Sirius that the marketplace had changed since the two companies formed. What’s changed about it? The iPod.
If the marketplace was the same it was back in the 90’s and satellite radio was only competing with terrestrial radio, this merger never would have happened.
Kevin Huxford
/ July 27, 2008Please…please…I beg of you…to not be foolhardy enough to confuse a government decision with something based in facts.
What’s changed since the deal? The administration. We have a pro-corporation Department of Labor and an FCC & DoJ controlled by the pro-corporation Republicans. The anti-regulatory Republicans. The pro-monopoly Republicans.
at least as valid an observation as thinking the iPod really changed things re: satellite radio. The iPod isn’t really that much different from having a bunch of mixtapes for your tapedeck. Of course, it has been used as the excuse for our government to drastically change our fair use rights, too. No, no anti-consumer patten there…
Bentcorner
/ July 28, 2008Kevin, do you have an iPod? Its not like have a bunch of cassette tapes. When I take my iPod out with me, I’m taking my entire music collection with me. That includes every album ever recorded by The Clash, The Beatles, U2, The Cure, Led Zeppelin, and a bunch of other musical groups or performers. I also have hours and hours of podcasts on my iPod along with a few audio books. All this fits in a small electronic device smaller then a pack of smokes.
Kevin Huxford
/ July 28, 2008Yes, Rick, I have one. And it still is like having a bunch of CDs or cassette tapes on you. All the iPod did was increase the accessibility of an individual’s music collection. That music collection already existed as an option to listen to before the iPod existed. As much as it’s a great piece of technology, it didn’t introduce a wholly new form of in-car entertainment. As much as it can store on it, 90% or more of the listeners that it would be “competing” for aren’t going on drives long enough that they need more than a few cassettes or CDs, either. And, due to the fact that a large majority of listeners wouldn’t listen to their whole collection straight through, but use a playlist instead, I compare it to a mix tape or CD.
And really, Rick…next time, skip the impulse to treat me like an idiot living under a rock who wouldn’t have some grasp of the iPod.
Bentcorner
/ July 28, 2008I really don’t know what you expect when you compare an iPod to a bunch of mixtapes. The two have nothing in common. A mixtape is a compilation of individual songs from plucked from different albums. A person can put their entire music collection on their iPod and take it with them. I was thinking perhaps that you didn’t have an iPod and lacked the first-hand experience of owning one.
Kevin Huxford
/ July 28, 2008Again, Rick, as I pointed out: since people use PLAYLISTS (you know, where you pluck individual songs from different albums) much more often than they just listen to their whole collection straight through or on shuffle, the two have plenty in common.
Just like file-sharing took the idea of recording a few songs from your friend’s copy of the CD and blew it up by a factor of several million, the iPod is just an exponential increase of the mix tape/CD concept (only not to as great a factor). It isn’t a new concept, but an improved upon practice.
Bentcorner
/ July 28, 2008I guess we’ll just have to agree to disagree.
buzcock
/ July 28, 2008you will never win an argument with Huxford. he is always right and everyone else is always wrong.
Schooly
/ July 28, 2008Yeah, I was going to post a response to that pedantic douchebag, but I figured his 75 year-old mind would just yell at me to get off his lawn.
Kevin Huxford
/ July 28, 2008Lovely class of reader you have here, Rick. I thought I had trolls on my blog, but apparently I have trolls on your blog now, too.
I’ll give you that Rick’s obviously better at walking away from a discussion, but just because I’m eager to argue my stance doesn’t mean I continue to contend that I’m right in the face of proof that I’m wrong. Yes, the iPod can store tons of music. But, in most common application, people use it to run some sort of playlist. The average commuter doesn’t travel far enough to exhaust a mix tape or CD, let alone a 6 disc changer. An iPod just allows more variety with less effort.
There are very few iPods out there that allow you to add music on the go, so they require some input and additional equipment, albeit to a lesser degree than mix tapes or CDs. Some now allow you to purchase over a wi-fi connection, though.
Which brings us back to the point about whether this is competition with radio (satellite or terrestrial). You have to buy the music you listen to (unless you have no problem with stealing via bittorrent). Listening to your own collection of music, also, lacks the ability to help you discover new music. You can see those as why they are non-competing animals or see those as just selling points for them to use to compete.
But I’m a 75 year old pedantic douchebag for that? Do you even know what pedantic means, Schooly? :) 75? Because I compare it to a mix tape? I submit that I’d be more 75-ish if I was wowed about how this is like some strange, new, alien technological achievement, rather than something that evolved from a basic version of the same concept. But that’s me.
Schooly
/ July 28, 2008BLAH BLAH BLAH.
It’s pretty obvious I know what pedantic means, isn’t it?
Schooly
/ July 28, 2008By the way, on here, YOU’RE THE FUCKING TROLL, GENIUS!
Kevin Huxford
/ July 28, 2008No, Schooly…you think you know what it means, but you don’t. I’m, also, not a troll here. Trolls are more concerned with making driveby insults than participating in an actual discussion. Guess which one of us fits that bill? :)
Bentcorner
/ July 28, 2008Schooly’s not a troll. He has been an active and valued commenter here for as long as I can remember. Maybe he wouldn’t have called you a douchebag if you hadn’t asked him if 2 was a greater number then 1. It seems to me that things went to shit right about then.
I’m more then willing to continue arguing whether or not an iPod is like a bunch of mixtapes, but only if you insist. What I am not willing to argue about is whether or not Schooly is a troll.
Because he is most certainly not.
Kevin Huxford
/ July 28, 2008If it walks like a duck…
Sorry, Rick, but you may not feel he can be defined as a troll in general, but you can’t successfully argue that coming through this thread with no other purpose than to drop an asinine insult isn’t troll behavior.
I don’t pretend like I can sum up a person’s character after having such a limited interaction with them, but I can definitely judge the quality of the limited interaction. I’m sure if I bumped into him at a bar after a con, I’d have a different opinion of him and he might not feel I was a “pedantic douchebag” (even by whatever his definition of pedantic is, versus what it actually means).
I’d actually be more interested to see what your argument for running in just to call someone a douchebag not being troll behavior is than going through you telling me that the iPod is completely different because it can hold so many more songs. Which, I guess, is to say there’s probably no point in continuing the conversation. ;)
Schooly
/ July 28, 2008For your benefit, old-timer, here’s the definition of pedantic:
http://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/pedantic
Main Entry:
pe·dan·tic Listen to the pronunciation of pedantic
Pronunciation:
\pi-?dan-tik\
Function:
adjective
Date:
circa 1600
1 : of, relating to, or being a pedant
2 : narrowly, stodgily, and often ostentatiously learned
3 : unimaginative, pedestrian
So which one of us doesn’t know the definition? Maybe you burnt up too many brain cells trying to compare iPods to mixtapes.
And for the record, just because YOU don’t fully understand the implications and uses of iPods and modern technology doesn’t mean that Ipods are like mixtapes. It’s an oversimplification that shows how unimaginative and pedestrian (see above) your thinking is.
Kevin Huxford
/ July 28, 2008To call it “unimaginative” would have to imply that the position opposite of mine is imaginative. Otherwise, it isn’t a quality worth noting when making a comment that, ostensibly, is meant to differentiate me from the other participant. Which do you think is more commonplace: saying an iPod is just the evolution of a mix tape or CD changer vs. saying it is something completely new?
So, I guess the problem with your misuse goes beyond knowing the definition and into the basics of useful descriptive statements. ;)
Bentcorner
/ July 28, 2008But that’s not what happened here. He left a fairly benign comment and you responded with something that (I think) would rub most people the wrong way.