Sirius XM Should Acquire Pandora
Today on ArsTechnica, there was a story about Pandora and how they can’t make any money. The Cliff’s Notes version to get everyone up to speed is this. Pandora is a revolutionary online radio program that uses the music genome project to take user preferences based on a few songs and program a customized radio station just for you. If you like your death metal technical, and swedish like Meshuggah, Pandora will play some Meshuggah. And then they will find other bands that sound similar like Lamb of God, or At the Gates or some other Scandinavian death metal.
It is brilliant. It is the future of radio. It has no business model yet.
SoundExchange is all but guaranteeing that the business model is going to fail. They are the royalty-collecting wing of the RIAA. They are in the process of imposing a fee of 2.91 cents per hour per listener for the right to broadcast music. It doesn’t sound like a lot, but it is. Satellite radio has a rate of about 1.61 cents per hour per listener. The reasoning for making Pandora’s rate so much higher is basically because their service is so cool. SoundExchange treats Pandora differently because it creates something of a 1 to 1 relationship with each member of its audience whereas SiriusXM has a single playlist for a station that maybe thousands of people listen to at the same time.
I wrote about the satellite radio merger the other day and mentioned that the whole satellite delivery method of radio was eventually going to become obsolete with the proliferation of mobile internet. I still believe that, but here’s the thing. The proliferation of mobile internet is far from upon us.
So in the left hand, we have a brilliant company that can’t seem to make money and faces the eventual shuttering of its doors. On the right hand we have a company that looks to be healthy in the short term as time starts to run out on its proprietary music delivery method. Somewhere in the middle, these two companies need to meet.
SiriusXM is only going to survive in the long run with a mix of content and technology. The first portion of that is to have original, exclusive content. Their exclusive deals with sports leagues like MLB and the NFL are a great way to start. Having Howard Stern, Opie and Anthony, and Ron and Fez is also a part of the equation. So where does the music fit in?
In the age of iPods you aren’t going to compete with an all-encompassing programmed radio station. So imagine if there were no music channels on SiriusXM. No adult contemporary channels. No hardcore punk channels. No hip-hop channels. Instead it was Pandora. Every listener has a few artists or styles and as they ride around in their cars listening to the music and giving minimal feedback, they are creating individualized music stations that will grow and change with them wherever they go.
It would be a big win for SiriusXM. It would be a big win for fans of music to not lose Pandora. Pandora needs subscribers. SiriusXM has subscribers and needs to make sure they futureproof themselves past the whole satellite delivery method. Pandora is a good way to do that.
Sirius-XM Merger Finally Approved
The FCC finally approved the merger of the only two satellite radio services in the country. It is kind of funny that it has taken this long, but we are starting to see the future for this new company. The funny thing is that I am betting it will only have to do with satellites in the very very short term.
The reason? This product.
This, looks like an ordinary wireless router, but it isn’t. This is a mobile wifi router from a company called WAAV. It has been announced already that mobile wifi technology will be available in some of next year’s Chrysler cars. This device grabs the mobile data signals from cellular carriers like AT&T or Sprint and broadcasts it inside your car (and about a 50-100 foot radius outside your car) so you can access the internet on the go. This means laptops, video games, and soon enough wifi radios.
This is an important point because if the internet starts being an accessible network on the road in every car, it will certainly marginalize the need for a lot of satellite technology. All that money that Sirius and XM have spent over the years will seem completely wasted as more and more people stop bothering with satellite antennae.
Then, the new merged Sirius/XM company is no longer anything more than a content company. Instead of selling a technology, they are just selling Oprah, Martha Stewart, Opie and Anthony, Howard Stern, NFL Football and Major League Baseball.
Except those last two will probably stop renewing their contracts with Sirius/XM because they won’t need a middleman to broadcast the radio descriptions of their games straight to consumers. So there is one lost selling point for Sirius/XM.
Also, the Sirius/XM music channels will have stiff competition from Slacker and Pandora that use user data to customize radio stations just for you, not to mention iPods which will easily be connected in any car on the road in the next couple of years. As it stands now, I would guess that at least 50% of cars being produced today have MP3 player functionality, at least by way of headphone jack.
It is through this filter that I find all the debate over Sirius/XM so hilarious. These two companies have done an amazing job developing a technology that will be completely unnecessary in a matter of years. As that happens, the content producers will be able to go directly to the consumers more and more, thus marginalizing the need for a company to consolidate talent into a service platform once and for all.
Does this sound like a monopoly to you? It doesn’t sound like a monopoly to me either.
Hat tip to MisterCrunchy, who actually commented on this site well over a year ago that satellite technology was going to be marginalized and obsolete.
Josh Homme BLASTS Abusive Audience Member
Note to self: Do not mess with Queens of the Stone Age lead man, Josh Homme. Apparently someone was throwing things at the band. Homme was sick and perturbed already. He unleashes one of the longest expletive-laced tirades I have ever seen. Oh yeah and then he throws a water bottle at the guy.
So, needless to say, if you have your speakers on, this video is not safe for work. Be warned the language is INTENSE.
Dax Riggs - Yesterday Cover
Dax Riggs used to be my favorite death metal singer on earth when he was the lead singer of Acid Bath. It has been a long damn time since he played in that band. Now he is 1/2 of Deadboy and the Elephantmen which has achieved a lot of cult success. But, he also apparently has played some bar gigs where he has broken out cool covers. My favorite so far is his version of Yesterday. Check it out before Yoko has it yanked of the internets.
The Fire Theft - Heaven Video
It is nice to find that some of your favorite songs end up on the internets. Even the really rare-ish ones that never made it “big.”
Minus the Bear - I’m Totally Not Down With Rob’s Alien
A great band (Minus the Bear) and my favorite song (I’m Totally Not Down With Rob’s Alien) in a medium quality bootleg video on YouTube. Minus the Bear was tops on my list of bands for a little while. They have fallen off a bit, but still one hell of a band live.
The Dismemberment Plan - Time Bomb
Those are some weird words to have grouped together in a heading that also make me feel really good. One of my favorite bands. One of my favorite songs. Also a hell of a video. There was a hubub over this video once upon a time because apparently the concepts were seemingly ripped off by the Vines later for one of their videos.
But, here is The Dismemberment Plan.
Now for the video that a lot of d-plan fans thought ripped off Time Bomb conceptually.
Explosions in the Sky - Austin City Limits
Explosions in the Sky will never hit the mainstream. They play instrumental guitar rock. That’s right. No vocals. Still, their music has this ability to be passionate and emotional. Their music was one of the brighter spots of the Friday Night Lights movie starring Billy Bob Thornton. They have a bunch of albums out. And now, they have done Austin City Limits on PBS. I found the video online and if you have 20 minutes to throw it on in the background, you should.
Canadian Rock From YouTube - The Tea Part and Chore
I was pushing around YouTube last night and I got on a jag of Canadian rock when it occurred to me that I hadn’t listened to The Tea Party in a long time, while a couple of their albums were favorites of mine for a long time. I started looking for my favorite song by them called Psychopomp. People here in the US never became all that turned on to this song, but you will see by the reactions of Canadian audiences how big the song was.
Then I found out that the band broke up and the lead singer is still out on his own doing solo stuff. Check out the solo version of Psychopomp.
And after watching these two videos, I remembered how much I loved the band Chore, also from Canada. They never hit it huge in the States either, but they have some really amazing songs. Here are two of them, General Warning, and The Hitchhiker.
Sneak Peak at Death Cab for Cutie’s “Narrow Stairs”
Death Cab for Cutie have been working on their follow-up to “Plans” for a while now. The release date is fast approaching, but if you just can’t wait to hear what the album is all about, a scouring of YouTube leads to some samples from Ben Gibbard’s solo tour this year.
Here are the samples that I found.
The Ice is Getting Thinner
Cath
Casino Blues
Sideblog 
- FreeTheAirwaves.org Tuesday, 19 August 2008, 7:51 am
Google has a vested business interest in this project, but I am rooting for them anyway. Google wants to take that unused fuzzy space between TV channels and broadcast internet signals all over the. […] - Browns vs. Giants - Preseason Game 2 Live Blog at WFNY Monday, 18 August 2008, 4:19 pm
The nice guys over at Waiting for Next Year are going to be live-blogging their event in a chat room over at their site. I am a geek, and will be joining them. Come on over. - Dan Gilbert is My Hero Sunday, 10 August 2008, 5:46 am
Cleveland Cavaliers owner on all the LeBron James rumors, ”The reason this thing is where it’s at,” Gilbert said, ”is that we’ve got a bunch of bored, East Coast sports writers who have noth. […] - LeBron to Europe? I Don’t Think So Thursday, 7 August 2008, 4:22 am
So, while the major media continues to plot LeBron’s departure from Cleveland, there is a sane voice out there letting everyone know how unlikely the most outlandish scenarios truly are. - Top Gun 2???!?!?!??!?!? Wednesday, 23 July 2008, 5:50 am
According to reports, the plot outline is, (wait for it) “The idea is Maverick is at the Top Gun school as an instructor — and this time it is he who has to deal with a cocky new female pilot.” - Be Afraid Utah Tuesday, 22 July 2008, 7:26 am
Carlos Boozer is a snake and one of the most dishonorable people in professional sports history. I guess I am not over this just yet. - How much you wanna bet… Thursday, 3 July 2008, 9:18 pm
That this 4-day work week will actually increase the amount of gasoline that these employees will be using? Instead of commuting to work, they will now be going to the grocery store, going to do som. […] - In-Car DVD Players are Stupid Thursday, 26 June 2008, 10:15 am
At least they will be when we get a load of in-car wifi!!!!! (I am such a geek.) - George Carlin is Gone Monday, 23 June 2008, 4:34 am
I once bet a guy in college that I could watch a George Carlin special on HBO without laughing. I did it, but it wasn’t at all easy. There is going to be a void left by Carlin dying. - Accepted Behaviors Tend to Increase Thursday, 19 June 2008, 12:15 pm
If you become too accepting of a condition that you really don’t want to encourage, you might just end up with unintended consequences.
