Sirius-XM announced the other day that unless it can refinance its debt it will seek bankruptcy protection.

Does anyone know what the merger plans for the technologies are, and how their joint viability will be affected?

There are talks involving DirecTV and Dish Network about a possible buyout of Sirius/XM.

There are talks involving DirecTV and Dish Network about a possible buyout of Sirius/XM.

Pretty soon everybody will just write one check out for their television, home phone, home internet connection, cell phone, wi-fi for your laptop, satellite radio, etc.... That check will be roughly twice the normal mortgage payment.:D

Pretty soon everybody will just write one check out for their television, home phone, home internet connection, cell phone, wi-fi for your laptop, satellite radio, etc.... That check will be roughly twice the normal mortgage payment.:D

Convergence. One of the new buzzwords.

Poor signal quality and too much money for a subscription.

If they asked for $2 a month, they'd sell 50,000,000 subscriptions. And maybe with that money they could find a way to make it listenable. First time I heard Sirius on a home stereo I knew I'd never pay a nickle for it.

Pretty soon everybody will just write one check out for their television, home phone, home internet connection, cell phone, wi-fi for your laptop, satellite radio, etc.... That check will be roughly twice the normal mortgage payment.:D

WRONG....3X yer mortgage payment !!!

Irony,

My definition of the word irony.

Is when "better" technology is on the verge of bankruptcy.

Not that FM is any better but I gots to laugh about this..

Grumpy

Now maybe I'm wrong, but it seems like when cable and satelite tv first came out the big selling point was no commercials. Now all the satelite and cable shows have as much or more commercials as regular tv and the price has gone way up and they now have us convinced that there are cable channels that we can't do without. All the while we spend only 10% of the time watching 5% of the channels that we pay for, the rest of the time we are watching regular free channels. Just an observation mind you.:scratch2:

Now maybe I'm wrong, but it seems like when cable and satelite tv first came out the big selling point was no commercials. Now all the satelite and cable shows have as much or more commercials as regular tv and the price has gone way up and they now have us convinced that there are cable channels that we can't do without. All the while we spend only 10% of the time watching 5% of the channels that we pay for, the rest of the time we are watching regular free channels. Just an observation mind you.:scratch2:

The part that drive me crazy at least with our cable service is that they have no way to sort down the guide to the maybe 25 out of 150 channels I ever watch. So to get to some channel I want see what is on it I have to go past a couple dozen slots I have never clicked on.

My cable company advertises that you get something like 150 channels but fail to mention that the same station is on 25 channels, another on 20, etc. I don't think there are 40 stations in total.

I have been an XM subscriber for over three years. The sound quality in the beginning was poor, but FM programming from Chicago has sucked for several years now. I bought a Polk Audio XRT-12 tuner for my home system and the sound quality still left quite a bit to be desired. In the last year or so, the sound quality has improved a great deal, to the point where it sounds at least as good as FM. If XM/Sirius goes off the air, it will leave people like myself very disappointed! Clearchannel and Bonneville have ruined FM forever...

SQ is far from perfect but I use mine mostly in the car, including Jeep when making long cross country trips at altitudes that are too high for the iPod, and occasionally listen to trance in the office... was a little frustrated with poor bitrate on The System but now that's been replaced and I think the bitrate is increased. The jazz and classical stations were good enough. I do hope they work out their financial woes because their service fits my not so unique needs.

Pretty soon everybody will just write one check out for their television, home phone, home internet connection, cell phone, wi-fi for your laptop, satellite radio, etc.... That check will be roughly twice the normal mortgage payment.:D

Make that Time-Warner. Charter is going to file Chapter 11. Another Paul Allen project (MS$$).

I have both. Two pads. My pick, as long as I don't have to talk to them, is TW.

The part that drive me crazy at least with our cable service is that they have no way to sort down the guide to the maybe 25 out of 150 channels I ever watch. So to get to some channel I want see what is on it I have to go past a couple dozen slots I have never clicked on.

Would be really nice if they let you pick your channels, including XM. Mix and match. They won't do it.

...In the last year or so, the sound quality has improved a great deal, to the point where it sounds at least as good as FM...
Interesting observation! How is that occurring within the technology?

I think I saw on the NYT online that Sirius-XM secured some financing to (excuse the expression) bail them out.