Life on the Road – Trucking News Blog

Did you know that Sirius/XM recently lost 1.7 MILLION subscribers! After being rescued from bankruptcy from Liberty Media back in February, Sirius/XM reported a first quarter loss of $236 MILLION dollars. Few people are buying radios and sales of new GM and Chrysler cars are dead which translates into no new subscribers. Sirius/XM has not come out with any new or innovative equipment in some time now and its present product offerings are, in this world of IPods, Blackberry’s, Twittering and the mobile internet, are “dinosaur” technology. Where is the Sirius/XM app for the I Phone? There isn’t one.

I’ve been a subscriber for the past 4 years. I thought it was great at first. Few commercials, new innovative content and great music. Howard Stern came on board with two channels which included Bubba and Ferrell. But fast forward. More and more uninteresting programming was added like the Martha Stewart channel and Oprah. The XM & Sirius channels for truckers are terrible. A tremendous amount of commercial time – on the talk and news channels – was sold. Annoying DJ’s with incessant annoying useless chatter was added to the music channels. As time went on the difference between satellite and terrestrial radio became undistinguishable. Why pay $13 a month for this. Apparently 1.7 million agree with me. And the merger of Sirius and XM, which I wholly supported, did nothing to make the product more desirable.

I recently had a wire problem with my Sirius radio. I haven’t been able to listen to satellite radio for the past two weeks. And, honestly, it has not been that bad. There are actually LESS commercials on terrestrial radio than on satellite. I’ve been running mostly in the Central time zone and I haven’t had to search for or change stations because of poor reception as much as I thought I used to. And I’ve enjoyed the local “flavor” that many of the non-satellite stations have to offer. You get local traffic and weather everywhere, not just in the major cities. And it hasn’t hurt to get my soul saved repeatedly by the numerous religious mega power stations throughout the Bible Belt. Besides, Christian music isn’t that bad. Although not a fan, I can also listen to Rush Limbaugh who is not on either Sirius or XM.

About the only thing I’ve enjoyed on Sirius is the self-proclaimed “King Of All Media”, Howard Stern. He is very much an acquired taste. Some people love him – a lot hate him. He has less than a year on his $500 million dollar contract with Sirius/XM. If you’re a “Bubba” fan, his contract status always seems to be up in the air. I’m sure, if Stern (and Bubba) can insure major media giants like Clear Channel that they’ll stop swearing they could easily command mega million dollar deals on terrestrial radio. But who knows if Stern would want to return back to the restrictions of censored radio. As far as returning to Sirius/XM, I don’t believe Stern likes being associated with a sinking ship. If he leaves Sirius/XM there is really no reason for me to continue as a subscriber. On I20 out West where there is no terrestrial radio reception – one advantage to having satellite is the uninterrupted reception – I can put in a CD or get any radio station in the world through my Blackberry. Right now I’m listening to Steppenwolf on Classic Rock 96.1 FM out of Mobile, AL. It’s great and FREE!

Photo credits: http://news.cnet.com/2300-1039_3-6181104-1.html, www.theiphoneblog.com/…/http://hitdawall.files.wordpress.com/2008/06/howard-stern2.jpg