October 15, 2001

12:38 AM

The future of radio is here, and it's called XMRadio. Satellite radio for your car, home, or over stream to your pc. The concept is second only to the programming. Via Perplexed.
posted by canoeguide (20 comments total)

The future is here.
No...here. Dang there it went again. Here it is now.
No...here.
posted by ktheory at 12:43 AM on October 15, 2001

The real question will be "are people going to pay for radio when perfectly crappy free radio exists?"

side-question: "will people upgrade their radios, just to pay for new monthly fees?"

second side-question: "why not spend some money on more CDs instead of ever listening to the radio again?"
posted by mathowie at 12:51 AM on October 15, 2001

The Special X station seems to be a lot of fun, if you're into incorrect music. Plus, I like the fact that there are on-demand news/talk stations that just do news/talk. I hate turning on the radio to hear some news or commentary and hearing nothing but sports, sports, sports on all the non-music stations.
posted by tpoh.org at 12:59 AM on October 15, 2001

It would be cheaper to invest in a world band radio, there's bound to be one station on the planet playing something non-boring at any given moment.
posted by riffola at 1:05 AM on October 15, 2001

Unfortunately, it seems the shortwave radio bands are being gobbled up by Christian fundamentalist broadcasters.
posted by tpoh.org at 1:15 AM on October 15, 2001

FWIW, I've been *loving* the bluegrass channel and the blues channel. I've found the programming to be really excellent... playing some really obscure and eclectic stuff, even a relatively unknown local band that I'm positive gets zero national airplay.

Also, I was disheartened to read that ClearChannel was a significant investor, although not listed as a "programming partner". Thank God.
posted by canoeguide at 1:24 AM on October 15, 2001

It's a good sign when you tune in and they're playing Built To Spill.

It's a bad sign when you take their music quiz and they claim Elvis Presley died in 1972.
posted by perplexed at 1:33 AM on October 15, 2001

And with the current ability to carry your entire audio collection around on an palm sized MP3 hard drive, the need for pay radio is reduced even further. I can't see adding yet ANOTHER monthly fee to my growing list.
It might go over in rental cars.
posted by HTuttle at 1:41 AM on October 15, 2001

Can you get porn on it yet?
It's not really technology until you can get porn on it.
posted by dong_resin at 1:53 AM on October 15, 2001

HTuttle, you bring up an interesting point, which has merit. But still, where did you/do you find out about music to buy or download? Radio? MTV? Shoutcast streams?

I guess my point is that, I have to discover music that is new to me somewhere, and it's easiest to just hear it in a "radio" format, and then go out and buy or download it.

Radio as we know it in the US today, more-or-less sucks, unless you can tune into a local station that isn't owned by ClearChannel, likely programmed from three states away and syndicated on 7 other stations. Thank the telecom bill for that. Payola, anyone? C'mon, who wants to hear Stained or Fred Durst again this hour?

MTV, VH1, CMT and others, with the amount of non-music related shows, ads, and mainstream content are hardly the way to go.

Shoutcast and other streams over the Internet can be quite good, independent, and ad-free... yet without a broadband connection, you're stuck with 24 or 32 kbps streams... and no-one has yet to find the money or technology to make Internet radio programming widely available away from a computer.

So, to me, I'd bet that *if* done properly, which seems to be happening, this thing is going to fly.

People need to preview music before they buy or download it...and this sounds like an affordable, quality option.
posted by canoeguide at 2:36 AM on October 15, 2001

Ay carumba! Check out those prices -- you need a new radio (or existing compatible radio), plus a receiver. Can't do it until the prices drop significantly. Look forward to it, though...
posted by davidmsc at 5:18 AM on October 15, 2001

Screw the future. I wish the past of radio were here.
posted by pracowity at 5:23 AM on October 15, 2001

dong_resin, bukkake over the radio probably wouldn't be pretty at all.
posted by lotsofno at 6:15 AM on October 15, 2001

many car manufacturers are installing satellite-ready systems in higher end models. should give the industry a needed helping hand.
posted by mich9139 at 6:19 AM on October 15, 2001

canoeguide: if I had to guess, ClearChannel is only an investor now because they're not sure the technology will go anywhere. Five years from now, if there's significant buy-in to the technology (probably by people struggling to get out from underneath the shadow of Britney and [insert name of boy band here - i've lost track] and wave after wave of country-pop and watereddownangrywhitesuburbanteenagerpunkmetal-pop, but I digress), they'll be right there to take over XM and serve the American listening public with the next set of manufactured bands. igh.
posted by Vetinari at 6:30 AM on October 15, 2001

I know someone who works at XM, have been to the studios, hung out with some of the engineers and sales people, and I gotta say, even though it's a really cool idea, I can't see this thing lasting very long. They're counting on at least a million subscribers. They expect many, if not most, of those subscribers will be traveling salesmen and long-haul truckers. I simply can't see it happening. Sure, installing the radios in high-end Cadillacs will get them some subscribers, but I can't see them having enough regular paying customers to support the ENORMOUS investment they've made in their studios and satellites.
posted by MrMoonPie at 6:59 AM on October 15, 2001

If it's more of the same manufactured bands you get for free, it will never fly.

If you can get truly interesting, eclectic music that never gets airplay, it may take off. I get the MusicChoice stations at home through DirecTV, and I think the playlists for my favorite formats could use more depth. It's still better than mainstream radio, but I don't know that I would pay for it as a separate service.

(However, if XM could bring Howard Stern into my backwater Okie market I would subscribe in a heartbeat.)
posted by Dirjy at 7:33 AM on October 15, 2001

dong_resin: they must've broadcast porn in trials or something. doesn't every innovation on the web begin with porn?


they were probably XXXMRadio in early stages.
posted by basmati at 8:04 AM on October 15, 2001

I wouldn't go laying out $350 for one of their radios if I were you; the trades reported just last week that XM has a burn rate like a 1999 dotcom, and is already teetering on the edge financially.
posted by aaron at 12:06 PM on October 15, 2001

Lotsofno:

Sound Engineer one: "Try the creamed corn."
(splaaaat)
Sound Engineer two: "No."
Sound Engineer one: "Try the spaghetti-ohs."
(sploooosh)
Sound Engineer two: "No."
Sound Engineer one: "Try the vat of collected innards from all those gums from the late eighties that had that weird splooge in them."
(spluuuuuurt)
Sound Engineer two: "Bingo."
posted by dong_resin at 2:14 PM on October 15, 2001