Okay, so the “ain’t” wasn’t very Englishy of me (and “Englishy” is?), but you’ll have to forgive me if I’m a little distraught. Today, XM Satellite Radio and Sirius Satellite Radio announced a merger. As a current XM subscriber and a former Sirius subscriber, I’m very concerned about what this merger will do to the service I’ve really grown to love over the past year.
Satellite radio is one of those things that you have to experience to find out how wonderful it is . I talked myself into purchasing a Sirius subscription just prior to my trip to New York with Sarah in 2005. We immediately fell in love with the commercial-free music and rediscovered a bunch of artists we had long forgotten about (while also discovering our love for each other! Aw, isn’t that adorable?).
Well, our love for Sirius didn’t last long. Sure, the NBA coverage was awesome, but the selection of music was very repetitive. After reading a bunch of reviews, I decided to take the plunge and switch to XM. I’ve never regretted the decision. XM has an amazing playlist, complete with a great ska and punk channel that I couldn’t find on Sirius. Sure, XM cut my Christian rock station, but I found a way to live without it. My concern is that with this merger, Sirius will start cutting all of the things I love about XM radio.
It would be ideal if the merger results in keeping the channels I love, adding the ones I miss (Christian rock!), and offering the sports programming that I saw as a great bonus. I’m not getting my hopes up. Besides the fact that the two companies are already discussing an a la carte service (how much am I going to pay for that?), I can’t help but wonder how homogonized the stations will become. Remember when MTV2 used to be the alternative to MTV because of all the music videos it showed? Is my ska and punk channel on its way out because it’s not as popular as some other channel?
And since I’m ranting (see how worked up I can get over technology?), what about the awesome Pioneer Inno I bought this past Christmas? Will I have to buy a new radio to receive both services? Ugh, I’m getting a headache.
Yeah, I’m unhappy. I’ll keep paying my $12.95 a month for now, while keeping my fingers crossed that this merger doesn’t screw up a really good thing.
