automophile

I am currently at the Consumer Electronic Show in Las Vegas. The cute blonde at the XM booth handed me a brochure today and informed me that all 68 music channels will be going commerical free in March, and they are also adding several channels for weather and traffic in major cities.

XM is now up to 1.3 M subscribers, so it seems that they will stay around for a while.

BTW - Acura is also a sponsor of the show, and there are TLs ALL OVER THE PLACE demo-ing the DVD sound system!

neuronbob

No wonder Acura didn't have an A-spec at the Detroit NAIAS today. I knew I should've gone to Las Vegas for CES!

Black_Pride

If XM currently has commercials and people are still subscribing, i dont see why they would voluntarily remove those commercials and lose that extra revenue. As much as I would love for that to happen, I dont believe it. I sure hope I am wrong...

drising

Probably a competitive issue vs. Sirius, who has promoted "commercial-free". Could also be that XM is reaching critical mass in subscribers.

I'm actually surprised at the March date provided to automophile. Yesterday, I heard a commercial on XM (how ironic) that beginning in February they'd go commercial free on music.

neuronbob

I got an email from XM regarding a February date--it was the same one quoted on this board earlier in the week, and I heard the same ad on XM numerous times this week. The cute blonde was wrong.

need4spd

check the XM website, details are there, they are aslo adding traffic and weather for 22 cities, 24/7 with updates every 10min

partagas

I have passes, why didn't any of you creeps post that you were going. I'm just sittinig aroud Zainoing. We go to CES most years.

What about Fresno? Well, I gues that for a city of its size, there isn't much traffic. Goat carts, you know.

nfnsquared

got the e-mail too. also heard they'll be adding 3-4 video channels as well. just heard it a couple of days ago, think it was on a local radio station news blip.

Rocketsfan

There was a thread about this several days ago - you may also find more info in that thread.

http://www.xmradio.com/lineup/index.jsp

drising

It's Sirius tha's adding video...the text below is from thecarconnection's coverage of the NAIAS.

Sirius to Offer Video by '05

Satellite radio company Sirius says it will offer up to four channels of video programming by the middle of 2005. The company told crowds at the Consumer Electronics Show in Las Vegas that it doesn't know how much it will charge yet for the service, but at the same trade show Delphi Corp. is displaying a video screen that can receive the Sirius broadcasts. Sirius says it will focus on kids' programming at first; the company also expects a big boost in its subscriber base this year, which has lagged behind rival XM because of Sirius' later market launch. XM recently reported that it had passed the million-subscriber mark.

davethebrit

What about pics of the cute XM blonde!!! Dude!! You messed up!!
<Grin>

Z Factor

It could be that Sirus (SP?) is cutting into their market share, and internal studies have shown that going commercial free will bring in more revenue than they would lose in the form of more subscribers.

technogeek

I also received email a couple of days ago. They will be going commercial free in February, and will juggle the channel line up. I was a little surprised that they were going to give up commercial revenue, but I'm not going to complain. I wonder if they weren't able to sell enough commercial air time and a high enough price to make it worthwhile. They can give a higher perceived value with commercial free.