Justice Dept. Approves XM/Sirius Merger 232
Ripit writes "Just yesterday the Justice Department approved the merger of Sirius Satellite Radio and XM Radio, a Sirius takeover to the tune of $5 billion. The transaction was approved without conditions, despite opposition from consumer groups and an intense lobbying campaign by the land-based radio industry. 'In explaining the decision, Justice officials said the options beyond satellite radio -- digital recordings, high-definition radio, Web radio -- mean that XM and Sirius could merge without diminishing competition. "There are other alternatives out there," Assistant Attorney General Thomas O. Barnett said in a conference call. "We just simply found that the evidence didn't indicate that it would harm consumers."'"
Re:Umm... what other Satellite Radio is there? (Score:2, Informative)
Re:Umm... what other Satellite Radio is there? (Score:5, Informative)
Comparing this with TV is the short-bus way of looking at it. TV you can only get from Cable (usually only one player in town), Satellite, or OTA (which isn't eveywhere either). I don't know of many places that you can't get at least 10 radio statios + internet.
It's a "new" format and it has to compete with other audio broadcast formats out there. Look at the bigger picture.
Re:Umm... what other Satellite Radio is there? (Score:5, Informative)
Your choices are:
1. Pay service like XM / Sirius
2. "Free" radio (and all the commercials that come with it)
3. iPods / MP3s / podCasts
They are all in direct competition for people's ears as they commute.
Re:Took them long enough... (Score:5, Informative)
I agree that a year is a long time for the Bush so-called administration to make a ruling that contradicts a law. Usually that's done before morning tea.
Re:Umm... what other Satellite Radio is there? (Score:1, Informative)
Re:Stupid (Score:1, Informative)
Re:Umm... what other Satellite Radio is there? (Score:5, Informative)
Having said that, even though I make trips like this at least twice a year, I still don't have satellite radio, because I don't see the need. Even with my cheap factory installed car stereo with no auxiliary jacks, I can burn a few CDs from my MP3 collection to fill the hours when there are no decent radio stations. Maybe if I did that sort of traveling on a monthly basis or something. Regardless, I have a hard time seeing the appeal of paying a monthly fee for radio unless I'm a traveling salesman or something. Radio is not like TV, it's not something that people will generally listen to in their spare time. It's usually something people listen to when there are no other entertainment options, such as when they're driving.
Merger is not complete. (Score:5, Informative)
Why I think this is a good idea (Score:5, Informative)
Radio needs Satellite radio! For the last decade, I have been striving to find quality programming on radio that wasn't lacking the polished professionalism of most college radio stations and at the same time wasn't the over-researched, payola driven, target market homogenization of your typical Clear Channel station. That was found in Satellite radio for me.
The key differences with satellite radio and AM/FM these days is this. AM/FM is losing listeners every day. Advertising is down 15% in the last few years and listeners are turning off the AM/FM radio for other mediums. Instead of taking a chance with formats like in years past, stations owned by large corporations and disappointed shareholders instead become more conservative and try to be less distinguishable than before to attract the largest number of listeners. What happens is a large number of stations in a given market end up with eerily familiar formats, with little to no variance in station programming.
Satellite radio has taken a different approach. With such a comparatively smaller audience nationwide when compared to there traditional counterparts, Satellite radio will do anything to attract listeners, and that has been through offering dozens of niche stations with specific programming. It's fantastic sitting in my car and listening to Deep House music in one station, NCAA March Madness another, and obscure underground classic from another. It's what FM used to be 13-40 years ago in my opinion.
In short, FM is playing conservative to keep what listeners they have and are losing daily, while Satellite is taking chances to draw whatever listeners they can get.
Why is this merger good? Both stations are fiscally hurting, and a quality medium like Satellite radio needs to be strengthened against not only AM/FM/HD radio, but iPods/Podcasting, and streaming radio online.
Re:Umm... what other Satellite Radio is there? (Score:5, Informative)
But, increasingly, the traditional radio stations are all owned by Clear Channel and the satellite stations are the only ones offering content like that. If you're looking for continuous, commercial free, specialized radio channels with national coverage
If the choice is down to the Clear-Channel payola and commercial dominated crap, or the now merged Sirius/XM broadcast on satellite, that hardly represents consumer choice. This is like a choice between the "old radio model" and the "new subscription model", with the option of playing your own CDs and MP3s thrown in.
Then again, I've long stopped expecting US regulators to actually do anything which preserves choice for consumers -- they just do what the corporations want.
And how will creating a new monopoly in the market not eventually drive up prices and deteriorate service quality -- I simply don't believe it's evey played out differntly. They're not in competition with the traditional radio stations, so among people looking for an alternative, there would now be exactly one game in town. Once there is one game in town (*cough* Comcast *cough*) they can abuse you all they like.
Satellite was the only alternative to the traditional model. I must say, I just don't get how this is ultimately better for consumers.
Cheers