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OK, OK, I'm behind the curve on a few things. Today I had the need to
rent a car, and it contained an XM-Sirius satellite radio. Once I got
over the shock of hearing raw language and the pleasure of having many
new selections, I was struck by the sound quality: It blows.

It varies from stream to stream, from type to type (low quality for
talk, higher for music) but overall, it's pleasing on the low end (but
even AM has a decent low end on most car radios) but very lossy and
phase-y on the high end. Yechh.

It used to be that new audio technologies offered improvements in
sound quality, but we are now in a phase where new technologies
actually constitute retrograde, a reduction in sound quality. I-Pods
and MP3s were a backward step in quality; Most internet audio sounds
atrocious (and internet video is even worse - it will NEVER replace TV
for quality, at this rate); now we have satellite radio, which offers
more choice and less interference in return for noticeably reduced
quality. It this what the future holds?