XM/Sirius satellite radio merger approved. George Soros invests heavily in it...

[cascadiance]

Many of us are concerned about what the prospects of XM and Sirius Satellite radio companies merging affecting the content of both companies as they become a monopoly in this space (in particular the two progressive talk channels between the two services).

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=show_mesg&forum=389&topic_id=2266462&mesg_id=2266462

At least one good item was announced yesterday when it was announced that George Soros's investment firm bought a heavy stake in both companies. So we do have at least one significant shareholder we can petition if they start trying to cannibalize channels that weaken the diversity both services currently offer universally over the country to help provide alternatives in many local markets (like here in San Diego), where now privately owned monolith Clear Channel looks to be on the warpath towards silencing the investments they earlier made in progressive talk stations now.

From: http://seekingalpha.com/article/54328-george-soros-buys-stake-in-sirius-and-xm-satellite-radio

George Soros Buys Stake in Sirius and XM Satellite Radio
posted on: November 15, 2007



Billionaire George Soros has taken a position in both Sirius and XM satellite Radio. The guru investor now has 1.21 million shares of Sirius and 103,265 shares of XM.

Famous for breaking the Bank of England, Soros has amassed not only a huge fortune, but a loyal following as well.

The investments into satellite radio come in the midst of the proposed merger between Sirius and XM.

Here's a later more detailed article. Still somewhat disturbing potentially is the various "tiers" of pricing, that perhaps will relegate talk channels into a far more expensive tier that will make them that much more unaccessable. It would be good to see what their proposed lineup would be at some point here.

From: http://www.cnbc.com/id/21821835

XM Chairman Hopeful for Approval of Sirius Deal
By Andrew Fisher | 15 Nov 2007 | 03:52 PM ET

On Tuesday, shareholders of both XM Satellite Radio Holdings and Sirius Satellite Radio voted approval of a $5 billion merger.

The deal got the support of Reed Hundt, who was chairman of the Federal Communications Commission when the two companies received licenses -- on the condition that they remain separate.

On Wednesday, billionaire investor George Soros reported in a regulatory filing that his fund had taken large stakes in both XM and Sirius.

XM Chairman Gary Parsons is hopeful about federal regulatory approval of the deal, which includes a variety of pricing plans based on the listening choices of subscribers.

...

The merger still needs the blessings of the Justice Department and the FCC.

FCC Chairman Kevin Martin has been a strong advocate of "a la carte pricing" by cable television providers. Parsons says the merger plan promises that -- and more.

"We offer a number of different packages: A music-only package, or a package that's family-friendly, so there's no adult content on there, and yet it's a lower price," Parsons said.
...

[shenmue]

1. I wonder when they'll start changing things

I have XM. I wonder if they'll add or drop channels. Probably some of each.

[cascadiance]

2. Perhaps now would be a good time to do a letter writing campaign to Soros...

To make sure up front that there are no plans to drop one of the two progressive talk channels (Sirius Left or XM's Air America channel) and that other channels like Sirius's NPR channels don't get whittle down too much too.

[shenmue]

3. Not a bad idea.

:hi:

[fasttense]

4. George Soros sure is making a lot of money of the "free trade" policies

of the neocons.

[mvd]

5. So how would they be separate?

It really doesn't sound like they will be very independent of each other.

[cascadiance]

6. That's a big question of mine too...

I think I read earlier someplace else that in fact there was a joint company venture already started by the two companies trying to merge their hardware pieces and perhaps developing radios that receive both services' signals. Actually that was an FCC requirement in the beginning that they have been ignoring over the years. So now there's a lot of incompatible equipment out there, which I think is part of the reason why satellite radio in general is not successful. One is too prone to them arbitrarily switching in and out content of their service and forcing upon the consumer the costs of switching, if they switch at all. I know that's why I dropped both of them, due to content games like that.

If they were able to just make the distribution portion a single company and therefore simplify the equation for consumers to whether you want a "satellite enabled" radio instead of either an "XM enabled" or a "Sirius enabled" radio but still maintain some autonomy between the separate companies that are doing content, that way the consumer would benefit from lower costs of entry in hardware, etc. but still have the diversity provided by competition of the back end services that hopefully one can opt into one or the other or both very easily as opposed to what people have to deal with now.

It's like people converged on the VHS videotape standard, but you still had different companies providing the hardware and you still had many other companies controlling what videotapes were sold. Having one company for all would concern me. I at least like the idea of being able to lobby Soros to make sure that these sorts of concerns are heard.

[Bill219]

7. Arbitron Book for Sat Radio

http://www.radio-info.com/in3_src/images/SP07_National_Satellite_P12.pdf

Very interesting stuff

[cascadiance]

9. Yes it is! Sirius Left actually looks pretty good amongst talk channels...

... and that's not even Air America voices. Air America looks like it does well with the AQH rating (raw rating hours) even though their cume is higher. Kind of the opposite of what happens between Fox News vs. CNN, where the more conservative Fox News gets higher raw ratings, but lower cumes than CNN. I suspect it's because XM listeners (and perhaps Sirius listeners) have more other right wing hosts on other channels to choose from than the progressive folks do. Therefore the raw ratings of both of the progressive channels are quite a bit higher than the right wing channels.

Source, AQH, AQH Rating, Cume, Cume Rating
Sirius Patriot - 1700, 0.0, 46800, 0.02
Sirius Left - 3000, 0.0, 59100, 0.02
XM166 America Right - 5000, 0.0, 132400, 0.05
XM167 Air America Radio - 7200, 0.00 109600, 0.04

[mvd]

8. Yep, I'm an XM subscriber and hope the variety increases..

and not decreases. It's the autonomy part I wonder about.