XM Satellite Radio Backlash 594
mrchubbs writes "Sponsors and subscribers to XM Radio are protesting the decision by XM management to suspend the Opie and Anthony show for comments made on an uncensored channel. Subscribers are canceling subscriptions — some estimate that between 20,000 and 40,000 have cancelled. Some are even smashing their radios in protest. Sponsors are pulling ads. Also, there is some evidence of XM not honoring cancellation requests, forcing multiple calls to finally get accounts canceled." Of course this dispute isn't a free-speech issue. "Free speech" refers to a prohibition on censorship by the government; XM is free to do as it wishes with the content it broadcasts, within the law.
Registration Required? (Score:4, Informative)
Password: slashdot
Enjoy!
Comment removed (Score:5, Informative)
XM not canceling account (Score:5, Informative)
Re:Speech, Schmeech... It's a Business (Score:2, Informative)
Re:Registration Required? (Score:1, Informative)
Re:I knew something was wrong with XM... (Score:2, Informative)
Re:XM not canceling account (Score:4, Informative)
The XM merger will have a hard time going through on other accounts, The Sirius CEO got a very lucrative of a bonus, too lucrative for a company in trouble: here [nypost.com], and XM admitted that some 40% of their retransmission antennas were not located in their approved locations, heights or power ratings: here [bloomberg.com].
Re:Not free speech, free enterprise! (Score:3, Informative)
The cost of making a one-hour drama episode has tripled in the last 15 years from about $1m in the early 1990s to $2.7m, according to some studio executives. Costs of thirty-minute comedies have also spiralled to $1.5m from around $700,000. Quality TV squeezes networks [msn.com]
Cable TV began as a community antenna service. There were adds from the beginning - but none that directly benefited the cable provider or subsidized the cost of original programming.
XM Not Cancelling Subscriptions (Score:3, Informative)
Re:Response (Score:2, Informative)
They were banned from Country radio.
But The Dixie Chicks survived and found a new audience. Cecilia Peck - Shut Up & Sing [laweekly.com]
So what exactly did they say? (Score:5, Informative)
So what did they actually say? Here's the transscript I've been able to dig up. Charlie is some character called "homeless charlie".
I've never listened to Opie and Anthony, nor do I subscribe to sat radio, but I have to say it's a lot less offensive than I imagined from the little "raping Condi Rice, Laura Bush, and the Queen" summary I've read. It's really not any worse talk than you'd hear a few guys in a bar saying.
I guess I have to agree with the comment that the suspension was really more about trying to appease any government contacts that Sirius/XM has to grease the wheels on the (IMO really bad for the public) merger between the two.
Re:Response (Score:1, Informative)
matthew 7-3 (Score:3, Informative)
On November 1 1983, the secretary of state, George Shultz, was passed intelligence reports of "almost daily use of CW [chemical weapons]" by Iraq.
However, 25 days later, Ronald Reagan signed a secret order instructing the administration to do "whatever was necessary and legal" to prevent Iraq losing the war.
In December Mr Rumsfeld, hired by President Reagan to serve as a Middle East troubleshooter, met Saddam Hussein in Baghdad and passed on the US willingness to help his regime and restore full diplomatic relations.
Re:Response (Score:2, Informative)
But a class action lawsuit goes straight to the point. I don't care who the vendor is, if they talk you into buying something, it should at minimum do what they advertise it to do. In this case, uncensored radio means exactly that, uncensored radio. You didn't by a receiver that you can't use on anything else and subscribe to a monthly service for less or partially censored radio, you did this for their uncensored radio. I wouldn't care about the service, up until now, it has been uncensored. But the receiver costs like $150 or more depending on the unit you bought and if you needed to pay someone to install it. XM should be refunding that for failing to deliver the goods.