[Schwoogie Johnson]

On Fri, 23 Feb 2007 03:20:07 -0500, JMiller wrote:

On Thu, 22 Feb 2007 14:49:04 -0500, Schwoogie Johnson
wrote:

On Thu, 22 Feb 2007 13:18:40 -0500, JMiller wrote:

On Thu, 22 Feb 2007 11:54:30 -0500, Schwoogie Johnson
wrote:

On Thu, 22 Feb 2007 05:41:09 -0500, JMiller wrote:

On Thu, 22 Feb 2007 09:21:25 GMT, "DAB sounds worse than FM"
dab.is@dead wrote:

JMiller wrote:
On Wed, 21 Feb 2007 07:02:16 +0000, Paul Webster
wrote:

"BadAsCan" wrote:

I told everybody in this group in 2005 that Sirius and XM were
going to merge. It was inevitable. The reason for the merge is
Howard Stern. Stern is just too powerful and has a huge fan base.
Howard will be the undisputed king of satellite radio

I'm not claiming any great knowledge here - but if Howard Stern was
the critical factor then wouldn't the company that has his contract
simply keep going alone and take all of the customers from the other?

That's the way it's working out, but it's not necessarily just because
of Howard. I have to admit that I think it totally is because of
Howard, though.


So you think that a $13bn merger is all about Howard Stern?? I have to say
that that is the most ridiculous thing I've heard in 2007. Well done.

That is because you are not smart. XM had been the frontrunner with a
clear and commanding lead over Sirius. After a year of Stern on the
air, Sirius has blown away XM.


Wait, what? After a year of Stern on the air XM still has a commanding lead on
Sirius. Not that any of this matters now, but holy ****ing flat out lie, Batman!

They outsold XM last year by a wide margin, and even though XM had
more total subs, the writing was on the wall.


Noooooooooo!

XM has outsold Sirius every quarter they have been in existence together.
(Neither company has filed a 10-Q with the info for Q4 2006, so Sirius might
have finally beaten XM for once.)

Let's use the last 4 quarters where full information is available. This will
help your case because it includes the monstrous Christmas push that Sirius got
in 2005 for Howard. (I'm not trying to hide anything - I just don't have full
4th Q info for last year and don't feel like digging through business websites
to find it. Sirius netted 905K and XM netted 442K if that makes you feel
better).


Here's Sirius's numbers:
GROSS CHURN NET
2005 Q4 1,266,674 -124,034 1,142,640
2006 Q1 960,610 -199,423 761,187
2006 Q2 830,545 -230,111 600,434
2006 Q3 732,406 -291,305 441,101


And XM's:

2005 Q4 1,377,300 -479,000 898,300
2006 Q1 998,300 -429,400 568,900
2006 Q2 926,300 -528,300 398,000
2006 Q3 868,000 -582,000 286,000


SIRI sold 3.79 million new subs and XM sold 4.16 million.
SIRI netted 2.94m and XM netted 2.15m.

So this outselling by a wide margin is bull****. And don't even if ALL of XM's
churns went to Sirius for Howard, Sirius's gross STILL didn't beat XM! If that's
the Stern Effect, it's pretty damn underwhelming.

And let's break it down even further. Let's split up Sirius's net subs by retail
and OEM. In other words, who actively chose to buy Sirius vs. who bought a car
that happened to have Sirius pre-installed and prepaid. (These numbers don't add
up to 100% of the NET above because of some stray Hertz subs that Sirius lists
separately. In no case were the Hertz numbers more than 1,000 for any given
quarter.)

RETAIL OEM
2005 Q4 900,645 241,705
2006 Q1 534,958 225,343
2006 Q2 276,294 324,574
2006 Q3 205,899 236,464

Sirius got that nice Howard bump for Christmas 2005, but look at what happened
afterwards. The people CHOOSING Sirius as opposed to just having it show up in a
new car dropped so far that the car buyers now represent more than half of
Sirius's new subs. The Stern Effect lasted about 6 months, centered around the
beginning of his new show. Anything else is just in your head. Those numbers
don't lie. This merger was no more about Howie than it was about you or me.

60% of Sirius subs are tuned to Howard 100 or 101. It's about Howard.


That 58% number was from half a year ago. Do you think that percentage is
holding up with all the new subs? Highly doubtful. That's why Sirius dropped the
ball by giving a percentage when the "Stern Effect" was coming to an end. That
percentage is only going to get smaller and smaller. Do you think all the people
buying new Mercedes, BMWs & Rolls are tuning into Howard??? **** no!


Period. End of story. If XM had Howard, XM would swallow Sirius, not
the other way around. What's in your head is thinking that raw sales
figures mean dick in satellite world. What counts is total net gain.


Sure, but attributing everything under the sun to Howard is just delusional.


All the sales figures prove are the more people bought XM and were
dissatisfied with it than Sirius.

And BTW, the Stern effect will never be over unless he quits
broadcasting. Do you still think that people are done buying Sirius
for Stern?


YES!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! Who is "discovering" Howard Stern in 2007?


If so, why isn't XM's total net sub counts beating Sirius
again? XM packed it in because Sirius had Stern and there was no way
for them to win anymore.

--
Opie & Anthony #6, Howard Stern #12, Talkers Heavy Hundred 2007
http://www.talkers.com/main/index.ph...19&Itemi d=44