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Glad they finally came to their senses. Imagine, the resources of the nation's government being leveraged to such an extent over subscription radio entertainment. Their findings are basically a listing of the blatantly obvious: The competition for satellite radio is...not having satellite radio. It isn't food, it isn't water, it isn't gasoline, it's radio, for chrissakes.
On a side note, the popularization of mobile broadband, imho, will provide an alternative to such services...I think you're going to start seeing, in the next few years, the Microsoft's of this world offering expansion of their in-car entertainment offerings to include web-based entertainment and information services (as in, I pull into town with my GPS as a guide, and at the touch of a button it gives me access to restaurant menus in the area, current live entertainment in the area, movie schedules, gas pricing, etc., as well as providing me access to web-based entertainment, email, text messaging, weather, VOIP, etc.). Sirius/XM would be well-served in exploring the feasibility of web-based service models for those who do not necessarily need a satellite radio to access these services.
MP3Car, I think, offers hobbyists a great place to gather knowledge and find products to suit them. I have my doubts, however, about the long-term prospects of this hobby as occupying the unique "niche" that it finds itself in at present. You see Microsoft offering their "sync" media players in various automobiles now, and I can only see the massive resources of such companies as MS and Sony as further encroaching into the space of such niche solutions as desktop PC hardware in the car and software solutions as StreetDeck and the roles it fills, over the next few years. Can you imagine what could be done if MS were to team up with, say, Verizon or Sprint on a mobile-entertainment/information package for automobile manufacturers? True integration, from the factory, harnessing capabilities we niche hobbyists have seen as our unique purview for some time.
Last edited by hithere; 03-26-2008 at 09:20 AM.
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