Sirius XM- new name and services
Unless Mel has a brand new name (which he doesn't) let's just go simple, cheap, and not confuse people. Sirius XM sounds the best so stick with it.
Now on to some services ideas.
You know those emergency radios with the hand crank for power, the light, siren, AM/FM/TV tuner? The TV tuner is analog so you can kiss that goodbye in Feb 2009 when TV goes digital. Every TV tuning radio for the US market must be redesigned with a digital TV tuner- so don't buy the wrong model at a cheap sale this year! During Hurricane Katrina, local radio was shutdown since people evacuated and had no power anyway. Wouldn't a satellite radio with emergency power be great? The radio stays on, the big TV news stations stay on. People could get news and comforting distraction. The satellite providers have already proved that they can turn on a dime and change programming (they created Client 9 Radio in a day). This should be something the FCC wants as a merger pre-condition. A platform for a useful public service, not just more lobbying dollars spent on the FCC as they drag it out. Just take an XM boom box and add a power crank to it- voila!
More video services. Sirius has 3 channels (cartoons, since low data rate works well with them- QVGA, 250kbps, 15fps is all you need to keep kids happy. QVGA looks fine blown up on a high pixel-density 7" screen). With the merger, the extra bandwidth from elimination of redundant channels will enable many more video channels. More than they need, frankly. Hopefully they built the video player to be able to handle more than 3 channels out of the box (I'm sure they did) when more become available.
Data file broadcast service. This is where it gets interesting. Satellite broadcast can deliver music, video, or any type of data, in either real or non-real time. Imagine a satellite radio that not only could store music (like the Pioneer Inno), but that could download a city guide and have it all cached. Maps, events schedules, digital coupons, city business phone book, etc. The major metros could each have a channel on the merged entity, and the file broadcast would keep it up to date through differential data downloads. Public service plus web-like information. I don't think you can program the Inno like a VCR, but that would be a nice add, too. There are many great shows on XM that my commute schedule just does not mesh with.
The data broadcast service could also broadcast audio/music and video non-real time (such as overnight) so that you have it available for playback the next day. Like PODCasts, but only mass-market since you are broadcast to many. This would take a fraction of the bandwidth of a regular channel, allowing for multiple low-bit rate services. How about an audio book channel?
Would it be possible for Sirius XM to provide some special data services for the government? The answer is yes. Amber alerts for satellite radio plus other formats, like the CAP alert (see http://www.incident.com/cookbook/index.php/CAP_Fact_Sheet ). I'm familiar with these since I wrote the software to parse the CAP alerts coming over UHF into text messages that I relayed over SMS to Nextel cell phones. Converting it to a feed for satellite that is 'read' using text-to-speech is simple.
I see great things for satellite radio. Even slumping cars sales could be spun right (listen up, Sirius XM marketing department). If you can't buy a new car, just upgrade your old one- Duh! For less than the monthly payment on the average new car, you could have a satellite receiver, new speakers, and about a year's worth of service. That's a bargain.
