| For all of those that say of a merger goes through and people don’t like what they have they will leave like it’s no big deal. Well it is, you people have no clue. Satellite Radio is a passion of mine. I’ve been an XM Subscriber for 4 years (3 subscriptions) and a Sirius Subscriber for 3 years (2 subscriptions) and love them both. A merger will do absolutely NOTHING for me except limit my choices, I could careless about the pricing, I already pay almost $47/month for radio and would pay a hell of a lot more. I have over $1K invested in plug and play receivers, plus a home theater receiver with XM built in. The money is irrelevant, it’s the potential loss in programming.
I’m not a fanboy of either service, I am a fanboy of the industry. Despite what the XM kool-aid drinkers think, XM is not better then Sirius and despite what the Sirius fanboys think Sirius is not better then XM. They both have very many positives, and where one has a weakness, the other makes up. XM fanboys bash Sirius for playing the same hits, Sirius fanboys bash XM for playing too much obscure stuff. Well as a living, breathing person, I want that. Sometimes I want nothing but familiar favorites, sometimes I want to be exposed to something new. It depends on how I feel.
As a dual subscriber if this merger takes place (which I hope it doesn’t) I will get screwed, to ‘vote with my wallet’ will not get me back programming I lost. You can bet redundant programming will be removed, you can bet the styles and attitudes will change and I don’t want that. I don’t care what the letters say what Mel says, things will change. There are some channels on XM I prefer to those on Sirius, there are some channels on Sirius I prefer over XMs. I like Big Tracks on XM better then Classic Rewind on Sirius I’m sure that there’s people who agree with me and some who don’t, I don’t want to lose my Big Tracks and I don’t want someone else to lose their Classic Rewind and either have to settle with one of those channels or some half assed hybrid.
I HATE terrestrial radio with a passion. I have no way of listening to it. I removed the antenna from my SUV, disconnected the antenna lead from the Ford factory head unit. At home, my home theater receiver do not have the FM and AM loop antennas connected, I threw them right in the garbage and I clipped the wire on my clock radio. At home I have plug and play receivers with the FM modulators enabled so I can listen to XM and Sirius on my alarm clock. Antique Radio and their latest gimmick, HD Radio is not an option for me. Commercials, Stupid DJs with lame banter, censorship, same songs over and over and over, limited styles of music I can’t listen to that garbage known as AM/FM Radio.
While I agree satellite radio competes with testicle radio, the fierce competition between XM and Sirius is what drives XM and Sirius to be as good as they are. I mean let’s face it, any moron with a half a brain could create a better listening experience then that of dinosaur radio. It doesn’t take much. And no, satellite radio doesn’t directly compete with an iPod. FM Radio and CD Players/Cassette Players/8 Track Players have been in homes and cars forever. Live versus Prerecorded, satellite radio and iPods while are in the same category (audio entertainment mediums) they serve two different purposes.
I want to unplug myself for this so called lifeline. Terrestrial radio is not a life line, it’s shit. I do not want to be interrupted by the National Weather Service to hear that we may get a half an inch of snow. This is Buffalo, NY it snows, we can deal with it. Thunder storms, big deal. I was an idiot and in the midst of our October storm that left the area a complete disaster area, I made a trip to Best Buy after work. 60 mile round trip in the worst snow storm we had in years, power lines down everywhere, tree limbs everywhere, near zero visibility, no traffic lights, in short it was hell. I left work to go to BB at 7:30PM and didn’t get home until after 1AM. I had no urge to turn on AM Radio to tell me how bad it was and that I’m going to be alright. Local news is bullshit and overrated. Bunch of hype, no real information. Use key buzzwords like *EXTREMELY DANGEROUS*, *HAZORDOUS*, *ZERO VISABILITY* then in a few days run promos about how when ‘the storm broke, you heard about it here first’. Yeah I don’t need that garbage. I was overjoyed that the HD feeds of my local TV channels wern't bombarded with that stupid closing and emergency information like the standard def feeds had. I trust in the event of a real emergency, God forbid another event like 9/11 or what have you XM and Sirius would switch all feeds to a simulcast of CNN or Fox News or something like that. Unless we are getting attacked, I don’t want to hear about.
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Time Warner Cable Subscriber
Digital Cable & Road Runner Premium
252 Channels, HD DVR & 15/1 Broadband |
