Now don’t get me wrong – I do NOT want Howard to retire NOR do I want the Howard Stern Show to end. But here’s the thing, SiriusXM is a great service – but it’s a service that I don’t really care about or need anymore.
When Howard announced he was joining Sirius Radio back in late 2004, I bought my first radio. I had been a Sirius/SiriusXM subscriber ever since. We had a radio in the car, and a radio in the house. I listened to Howard live every day, and listened to music pretty much the rest of the time.
Then the SiriusXM app came out, and we were able to listen to Howard through our phones or through our computer. No need for to even have a radio – so we got rid of them. In all honesty I’m not even sure if it’s saving us any money – but now all I do is use my Sirius app to listen to Howard. I pay a nearly $50 bill every quarter for a service that I use – and I only use it for one show.
Like I said before, it’s not that SiriusXM is not worth it – it’s not that it is a bad service by any means. I just 100% know for a fact that if Howard announced he was leaving, I would cancel my Sirius account that moment his last show aired.
Please Don’t Go Howard
Here we are in the final week of Howard’s second contract with SiriusXM. Can you believe he’s been on this service for 10 years? The show has been consistency great, though it has changed and it has evolved over the years. The Wrap Up Show is no longer a must-listen, and in fact I’ll fast forward or skip it all together most of the time – that change failed as far as I’m concerned.
But after Howard’s show is done for the day, so is my listening of SiriusXM.
I have a feeling this week we’re going to hear that Howard has re-signed with the company for another five years. But what if he didn’t?
What if he announced to us that the show will continue – on it’s own?
Check out my terrible Photoshop work – you get what I’m trying to say, right? What if Howard became a 100% Internet show that we paid for directly? Almost like HBO Now or the WWE Network. We get content from a provider directly and we pay them directly. No middling service. Just a web site – and an app.
Would you pay $9.99 or maybe $11.99 directly for the full Howard Stern experience? A live feed throughout the day repeating his show, plus a full library of on-demand content? Not that dissimilar to what we already have with Sirius – but without Sirius. Without anybody.
I know the argument is – but we get Howard and SO much more with Sirius. But what do you listen to that you can’t live without? Music? Most of my music listening comes from the files on my phone or existing FREE streaming services.
And does anybody else give a shit about all those other shows on there? The sports are nice – but as a Boston sports fan I get plenty of local talk radio to fill that need.
I’ve always wondered how SiriusXM would fare if Howard ever left. Not that I wish ill will to them in any way, but I do sometimes wonder how many of their shows would still be on the air, how many hosts/jockeys they’d be able to keep on. Would the Howard effect be that large even?
Last week on Howard they mentioned that Will Smith was going to be coming in. Does that mean he’s coming in this week? If not, I think they juts slipped that the show is coming back – and probably coming back to SiriusXM – and if it does, I’ll be there paying my quarterly bill and listening to them through the app and web site.
But there will still be a part of me that wishes they took that next step into another chartered territory – one that seemed silly five years ago, but today is a very legitimate part of media.
And who better to really solidify that legitimacy?
Bye for now.
