Good bye Sirus/XM; Hello Sirius/XM

Well I was an XM subscriber since before the merge. I ONLY started the service for Opie and Anthony and didn't regret it because I was able to listen to their humor in all its unedited goodness.

Being able to hear the F word pop out of Jimmy Nortons mouth was quite the treat and it seemed they had the honest decency of knowing not to abuse it. It came out when needed or for comedic timing then tucked back under its rock until summoned again.

I enlisted for both subscriptions, Radio and Data, so that I could leave the radio in my girls car and for myself I used my iPhone with unlimited data to basically rape AT&T anally in data usage.  She loved XM but hated O&A and always bitched when I turned it on in the car berating them as classless white trash (needless to say they each make more in a week then either of us make in a year). That is until stock holm syndrome set in and I would occasionally turn on the radio to see it was already set to the Virus, their home station. Then came the death of Michael Jackson and she was HOOKED. They spent basically the week talking about it and she couldn’t change the station; for its “news worthiness” of course. 

Now back to the point of the story.

XM though it never really changed price has become an unnecessary expense to my tight budget in these arduous times. On top of that I was plagued with CONSTANT problems. I was sure the radio portion worked fine but on my end, the “APP” end it was pulling out my hair (what little I have left). 

•   I dealt with repeated boot offs saying I lost my data connection when I didn’t.
• My account was constantly being told it was locked or logged in somewhere else
• The Virus station would repeatedly shut down for no reason and when starting back up it would repeat the last 10 minutes only to stop again in the same place and continue with this hellish loop of never knowing what happened next.

 I dealt with this though for the love of my O&A; I mean we had been together since the WNEW days when they were on afternoons. I would call customer service and complain, they would run through steps I had already done while making excuses, and then tell me I should be using my car radio to listen. But then why am I paying an extra 4$ a month for your data plan, and why do you offer an app? You would think the problems would have stopped when I got to work and turned on my computer to listen but it didn’t, yes I am one of the few people who have a fully open computer at work to use, and this made it even worse. Now for the topper, the proverbial corn on my shit sundae. These problems NEVER happened on the other TWO, yes TWO, stations I used. Alt and Octane were issue free but for some reason the Virus was the bastard red headed step son of the abusive XM dad. 

 I started finding myself using slacker more and more for music and honestly it was leagues above XM since it seemed most of their music stations were on endless loop using the same rotation of songs like a cheap retail outlet. I was now ONLY turning it on for O&A, but I had it.

I called to cancel after giving my girl the bad news and they expressed their desire to keep one of their last 4 lingering customers and offered me 3 free months. I took them but as of two days ago it expired. I thought I would go running back but I have resorted to doing something I did for a short time before I finalize my XM. I have begun receiving the O&A show using different methods. Like a magician I can’t say but I am sure you can figure it out. I unfortunately hear them a day late but I have realized the few times I tried calling in I never got through; the times I tried using instant feedback it never was used, and besides my girl there is no water cooler talk about the show. Honestly I’m the only one who actually cares, and most of my listening was done in the gym after work during the replay anyway. I know what some of you might be thinking

“But by you listening this way you’re stealing from O&A and if you love them so much you should pay for their service”

Or

“You’re listening doesn’t show up on their numbers so your destroying them when they don’t get renewed due to low ratings!” 

Well the way I see it I was paying roughly 40$ for 3 months, some odd 120 station. I used THREE. There for in my opinion they owe me money, and XM will pay them the same. More subscribers does not always mean more money to the show it means more money to management. How much management wants to pay them is still a matter of debate. For the second point if XM cared about my ratings they would have made their data service work right. I know I’m not the only one with these problems since O&A have spoken about them on the show themselves.

XM truly appears to be dying anyway. Their stock is crap and I have yet to meet another person outside my direct group who actually has it. They really need to reevaluate the pricing model if they expect to last in these times. Offer more customizable packages or just reduce the price a bit. For 10 stations of your pick you should pay 5$ monthly tops. 

Now if you’re an O&A listener you’re well aware they are disgruntled in their company and mention daily their contracts are ending. Why don’t you two man up, re drop your balls and start something on your own. Stop whining you two little girls and make your own radio podcast and sell it for like a 5$ monthly sub. Run a live broadcast off a site too.  Another suggestion is jump on the next big thing in listening media which is free internet radio. Go to slacker and strike up a deal. Slacker offers a 4$ and 10$ package. If you were offered on the 4$ package I am sure people would pay. You could also make your money off advertising.  Maybe I live in a crazy world where people should actually get good service and products for their money. A topsy turvy upside down realm where cost equals value. Or maybe I’m insane and even right now not really typing on my useless blog and just sitting in a rubber room somewhere talking to and shitting myself.

Who knows.

is XM worth it