Eagle-Tribune "Help "Desk"
Sunday, February 13, 2005
By Al Gordon
Columnist
Pay a monthly fee to listen to radio? How silly is that? You wouldn't pay to get TV programs, would you? Oh, wait ...
Satellite radio is a technology that is on the cusp of going mainstream. Last year, XM Radio, the market leader, jumped to 3.2 million subscribers from 1.3 million the year before while No. 2 Sirius Radio went to 1.1 million from 260,000, according to the companies' statements. XM says it is aiming for 5.5 million subscribers by the end of this year, while Sirius's target is 2.5 million.
That is still a minimal foothold compared with the 223 million listeners claimed for broadcast radio by the National Association of Broadcasters. More to the point, XM and Sirius are losing money while broadcast is highly profitable. Not as profitable as in years past, perhaps, but still comfortably in the black.
But the rate of growth, combined with everything from new satellite radio units to the current regulatory climate, potentially may change the whole ballgame.
Literally change the ballgame, in fact. Sirius struck a deal with the NFL to broadcast pro football in the just-ended season while XM signed up Major League Baseball and will be on the air with those games this spring. The two companies also have lined up other professional and college sports. Thus, Patriots and Red Sox fans now can tune in their games anywhere in the country.
The satellite channels both offer dozens of commercial-free music channels that cater to virtually every definable genre. This is one of the areas where broadcast radio is deficient -- as major national conglomerates have taken over local stations, local flavor and diversity in content are in short supply. XM and Sirius play music that you don't readily find on the air and also throw in some unusual mixes. I am fond, for example, of XM's eclectic "Fine Tuning" channel where you might hear classical one minute and rock the next.
The biggest changes in satellite programming in the past year, though, have been in the realm of talk, where Big Names who have been squeezed out of the broadcast world now have found a home. At the highbrow level, that has meant Bob Edwards, longtime NPR morning host, now does a talk show on XM.
Highbrow, however, isn't the cornerstone of the new satellite world. The showpiece development has been the arrival of well-known radio "shock jocks" -- Opie & Anthony on XM; Howard Stern with Sirius. No strangers to controversy -- or to Federal Communications Commission complaints -- these performers have decided that their days on tightly regulated airwaves are numbered and have moved to the less regulated satellite world. This is now a big part of the satellite radio business model. The companies believe that, as a XM spokesman put it, with racier, edgier content than broadcast radio they will woo audiences the way HBO does on cable TV.
New equipment also figures into the mix. In preparing this piece, I looked at Sirius's "Sportster" a $100 unit that, with the proper adapter kit, can be played at home, in the car, or as a "boombox." The home and car adapters cost $50 the boombox is $100. This piece was designed to complement Sirius's NFL broadcasts by giving the user alerts when their favorite team's games are on.
For XM I tested the Delphi $350 "MyFi," the first Walkman/iPod-like satellite receiver to hit the market (several more will be out later this year). The lofty pricetag reflects the fact that the unit ships with car and home kits included along with a dizzying array of antennas, stands, mounts and clips. It also includes a built-in recorder so you will have tunes when you are out of satellite range.
A word on that last point: in metropolitan areas the services supplement their satellite signals with ground-based transmitters, but otherwise you must have line-of-sight contact with their satellites. So if you are in a tunnel, for instance, no signal. Sound quality of satellite radio's digital signal is better than broadcast, not as good as CD.
Although home use is on the upswing, the backbone of satellite radio is car installations. Formerly it was usually an add-on, but now it increasingly is coming as a factory option from the automakers. Here XM has had an edge because Honda and GM both own a piece of the company and have been aggressive about offering it in their vehicles. Sirius has deals with Ford, DaimlerChrysler and BMW. Toyota, Nissan and VW offer customers a choice of either service.
What's the difference between XM and Sirius? About three bucks a month. XM is $10 per month; Sirius $13. All other things being equal, the choice there is pretty obvious. Things aren't necessarily equal, though. If NFL is more important to you than MLB or if you can't live without Howard Stern, or if your car offers only Sirius, you might lean that way. My tastes, though, run to XM and to saving three bucks.
Al Gordon is a Massachusetts-based media and political consultant who also writes about technology. You can read more of his articles at www.tnpcnewsletter.com/al and e-mail him at eagle@algordon.com.
Thursday, February 17, 2005
Sunday, February 13, 2005
Look before leaping into digital convergence
Eagle-Tribune "Help "Desk"
Sunday, January 16, 2005
By Al Gordon
Columnist
"Convergence" was the buzzword at last week's Consumer Electronics Show in Las Vegas.
Oh-Oh.
Digital convergence is kind of a high-tech equivalent of the Big Dig: The completion date and the price tag are elusive. The concept is simple enough: Consumers have an ever-increasing array of devices in their homes, especially in the home entertainment category, and coordinating them would allow for more efficient management. But the devil, as always, is in the details.
"We are at the forefront in making broad technology investments and delivering breakthroughs that bring the digital lifestyle into the mainstream," Microsoft Chairman Bill Gates said in his CES keynote speech. "Our strategy is to deliver great software and a platform for partner innovation, so consumers can choose from a vast array of devices and services that work together seamlessly and suit the way they live."
Double Oh-Oh.
There is a joke that has made the rounds on the Internet about what a car built by Microsoft would be like, the punch line being that periodically for no apparent reason and at the most inopportune times the car would stop dead. You would have to close all the windows, turn off the ignition, and then restart it to get going again. (This gag takes on a whole new meaning with Microsoft's CES announcement that it was making a push into automobile electronics.)
Let's put that in terms of home entertainment: When was the last time you had to reboot your TV set? TV sets just work. Watching TV via a computer such as one running Microsoft's Windows Media Center, is comparatively a hassle.
Media Center PCs, in fact, are an important case study. It was well known when Microsoft unveiled the technology in 2002 that the software was at best a rough draft of the concept and early adopters were essentially going to be lab rats for the company's home entertainment R&D. Therein lies the reason for an "oh-oh" about convergence: Just because something is a good idea doesn't mean it's ready for prime time. Accordingly, I would suggest some criteria for measuring the value of convergence products:
Sunday, January 16, 2005
By Al Gordon
Columnist
"Convergence" was the buzzword at last week's Consumer Electronics Show in Las Vegas.
Oh-Oh.
Digital convergence is kind of a high-tech equivalent of the Big Dig: The completion date and the price tag are elusive. The concept is simple enough: Consumers have an ever-increasing array of devices in their homes, especially in the home entertainment category, and coordinating them would allow for more efficient management. But the devil, as always, is in the details.
"We are at the forefront in making broad technology investments and delivering breakthroughs that bring the digital lifestyle into the mainstream," Microsoft Chairman Bill Gates said in his CES keynote speech. "Our strategy is to deliver great software and a platform for partner innovation, so consumers can choose from a vast array of devices and services that work together seamlessly and suit the way they live."
Double Oh-Oh.
There is a joke that has made the rounds on the Internet about what a car built by Microsoft would be like, the punch line being that periodically for no apparent reason and at the most inopportune times the car would stop dead. You would have to close all the windows, turn off the ignition, and then restart it to get going again. (This gag takes on a whole new meaning with Microsoft's CES announcement that it was making a push into automobile electronics.)
Let's put that in terms of home entertainment: When was the last time you had to reboot your TV set? TV sets just work. Watching TV via a computer such as one running Microsoft's Windows Media Center, is comparatively a hassle.
Media Center PCs, in fact, are an important case study. It was well known when Microsoft unveiled the technology in 2002 that the software was at best a rough draft of the concept and early adopters were essentially going to be lab rats for the company's home entertainment R&D. Therein lies the reason for an "oh-oh" about convergence: Just because something is a good idea doesn't mean it's ready for prime time. Accordingly, I would suggest some criteria for measuring the value of convergence products:
- Do they make the task at hand easier or more complicated?
- Do they require adding another device or do they let you eliminate some?
- Do they give you more access to your entertainment material or do they limit it?
- Perhaps most important: Do you wind up paying more or less?
Gates correctly notes that the cost of data storage is down sharply and the bandwidth (data-carrying capacity) of home networks is up sharply. Also, consider the number of ways music can come into your house: broadcast radio, satellite radio, music channels from your cable or satellite TV provider, digital recordings on your PC and portable music plays, plus CDs, which you can play on a host of devices including your PC and your home stereo CD player. How many different media format versions of the same song do you need to have? Ditto for video.
I can personally testify to the value of consolidation and coordination. A couple of years ago, my wife and I did a total rehab of our condo and -- because we did not want to have to rip apart our walls ever again -- we got ourselves literally and figuratively wired. As a result, there is a ridiculous number of cables snaking throughout our unit hidden behind wallboards and crown moldings, plus two mammoth equipment racks stacked with audio-visual components. Very expensive and very complicated.
This turned out to be really bad convergence. We invested in an Escient Fireball, a device with a computer brain and Internet access, that you couple to CD jukeboxes (those carousel players that hold hundreds of CDs) to manage and play your CD collection. This flunked three of my tests: more equipment, more complicated and more expensive. Had we waited a year or two we could have met our need for music management at a fraction of the cost through such media networking devices as Apple's AirPort Express or SMC Networks EZ StreamWireless Audio Adapter.
So beware of all the consumer electronics hype in the months ahead. If you apply these common-sense tests to the companies' claims, you are more likely to be a happy customer.
Al Gordon is a Massachusetts-based media and political consultant who also writes about technology. You can read more of his articles at www.tnpcnewsletter.com/al and e-mail him at eagle@algordon.com.
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