Slacker Sucks Thread. People who want to bag on Slacker and Pandora.

[TSavery]

I have oft stated that there are things that Slacker does that Sirius XM should emulate. For internet listening of MUSIC, Slacker has some really cool features:

1. I like the band Rush. I create a Rush station, and every fourth or fifth song is a Rush song. I hit my "heart" button each time one comes on, and suddely I have a decent collection of Rush tunes in very little time. to amass the same collection listening to Sirius XM would take a long time. When I bring my portable into the wiFi network, all of my channels refresh.....but my saved songs remain. Thus I get new content frequently, and can save my songs as well.

IMO Sirius XM has not taken the Internet side of their service to a level that competes with the Slackers and pandoras of the world. Perhaps, with the iPhone app, they will begin to get there.

2. Customized channels are a wonderful thing, and an obvious benefit for Slacker consumers. Sirius XM needs to get to this point. As yet, they have not. There is no reason that Sirius XM's Internet service can't be even more robust than the satellite service. They simply have not taken the step.

3. Would you like the ability to skip a song you don't like?

As a listener of music, you need to ask yourself a few questions:

A. Would I like the ability to customize my own channels by genre, artist, or even timeframe?

B. Would I like the ability to hear songs by artists I like with ease, and save those songs quickly and with ease?

C. Would a more robust capabilty on Sirius XM's Internet based service be an appeal to me? Would it be even more valuable if I could take those songs with me?

No, Slacker does not have news, sports, and talk. Yes, the playlist can be repetitive if your customized channel has a narrow focus.

My point has always been that Slacker has some cool features that make it appealing. I think Sirius XM could emulate those good qualities and deliver a better service for consumers.

For those that hate the Slackers and Pandora's of the world:

What will you say when Sirius XM does begin to offer customized channles? Will you say it is bad? What will you say when Sirius XM makes saving songs by a particular artist easier? Will you hate it?

What Sirius XM needs to do is see what is a success and at least try to emulate the good things offered by another service. I find it ironic that Apple does not get this ire, yet it far and away outsells Sirius XM, Pandora, and Slacker combined. IMO Slacker is easier to use than an iPod, and offers me more functionality. Slacker allows for new music discovery by refreshing channels. An iPod does not do this.

The main point again is that Sirius XM can improve their internet side of the service and silence these Internet competitors because the Sirius XM name has awarness and recognition. Sirius XM can also market an enhanced Internet service to existing satellite only subscribers and garner more revenue.

[otone]

Charles, the basic services are free (and probably good enough for the majority of the users). That was LTS's analogy.... that the bar was giving free product away to the customers... He just forgot to say that Seagrams and Budweiser were paying for it

Tyler (and Charles), you are right. The product that Pandora and Slacker both provide meets a need. I thought it was cool that I plugged in "The Coasters" and got a bunch of related music. Enjoyed almost all of it. I'll be in your camp as far as Why give up that ground to Slacker and Pandora. That may be coming down the road...soon hopefully. Maybe we'll start seeing the future with the introduction of the iphone app (and hopefully other platforms as well.....but man, can you believe the secrecy behind this? Not 1 screenshot being leaked on an app that is supposed to be out in the next month or so). I really hope their "traditional" radio programming doesn't go away. But hey... whatever the market wants, I guess it is important to adjust.

[relmor2003]

Yes you can. What makes Slacker different from Pandora is the portable units, G1 and G2. They store the radio stations, about six hours worth per station and let you listen anywhere. You can update the stations via wifi.

So if Im on a 3 day fishing trip, I get 6 hours. Failed. Once again, if Im fishing , its worthless. No wifi tower nearby. Special features SiriusXM offers as well. So its a portable mp3 player with 6 hours of random songs, I might like. Or I could use my mp3 player, and have tons of songs I do like. Sounds like Slacker is more competition for an mp3 player. Wrong market. Not a radio station. Apples and Oranges. Its a cute computer music generator.
Next....

[James]

So if Im on a 3 day fishing trip, I get 6 hours. Failed. Once again, if Im fishing , its worthless. No wifi tower nearby. Special features SiriusXM offers as well. So its a portable mp3 player with 6 hours of random songs, I might like. Or I could use my mp3 player, and have tons of songs I do like. Sounds like Slacker is more competition for an mp3 player. Wrong market. Not a radio station. Apples and Oranges. Its a cute computer music generator.
Next....

It's six hours per station. The Portable can hold 15-40 stations, You can customize the stations to your tastes.

That said, for a three day fishing trip I would probably bring my Stiletto along. Last time I went on a cruise I brought the Stiletto along so I could hear CNBC on deck. But guess what, at night in the cabin, I relaxed to the Slacker Portable.

I can appreciate both. It not an "OR" situation

[SiriusBuzz]

Charles, the basic services are free (and probably good enough for the majority of the users). That was LTS's analogy

Right, but he was suggesting that they were not making money, but they are and people should understand that.

but man, can you believe the secrecy behind this? Not 1 screenshot being leaked on an app that is supposed to be out in the next month or so). I really hope their "traditional" radio programming doesn't go away. But hey... whatever the market wants, I guess it is important to adjust.

No, I cant believe it. There isnt a day that goes by that I am not puzzled by the fact that no one from Sirius XM approaches me with any kind of information.

Sounds like Slacker is more competition for an mp3 player. Wrong market. Not a radio station. Apples and Oranges.

Does terrestrial compete with satrad?

If someone cancels their sirius sub and signs up for slacker... what would that mean?

As of today, I can almost say with 100% certainty that if Howard Stern leaves in a year and Sirius XM doesnt do something about the remaining censored show in his station that I will leave for a service such a slacker. I dont live in the middle of the country and I am not an over the road trucker so, the things that make Sirius XM "neat" just wont do it for me. If I cant have good talk radio I want to top quality music. To the point that the first thing I do when I get a new car is strip the entire stock stereo out of it. When it comes to good sounding quality music, sirius xm is sub par.

Again, you state there is no competition in your eyes but, there is, so your feelings don't matter. I can't believe anyone would be dumb enough to click on a spam link or read and click through a spam email about "making your penis bigger" but it happens, that is why those emails keep coming... you can thank your fellow man for being retarded. Just because you don't find something believable doesnt mean that it is not true.

There are people on this site and others like it talking about they use both services or how they have left one service for the other so, they compete. But, you already knew that.

Its a cute computer music generator.
Next....

So, if you are in it for the music... then what? Sirius XM loses? You might not be in it for the music but, I am sure that quite a bit of their subscriber base is.

So if Im on a 3 day fishing trip

Out of Sirius XM's tens of millions of users, what percentage of them go on 3 day fishing trips?

Food for thought (tyler can jump in on this one)

I specifically remember looking into Slacker a long time ago and started to cover/follow them because they were slated to be a SATRAD company. One has to wonder if they did not wind up going down this road because that delivery system is soon to be obsolete. Personally, I dont think that solid internet access in cars is more then 5 years away.

10 years ago it took literally minutes to download a picture on dialup and 5 years ago you could barely surf the web on a cell phone. Now we can surf a website on an iPhone in 3g in damn near real time. There is already internet access services out for cars, how long do you guys think it will really really take to be strong enough to stream music? I think 5 years is very realistic.

Like Tyler said, what will you guys think if Sirius XM replicates slackers technology? That would be stupid right?

[Hopeful]

Charles,

I have been fallowing your debates the last few days. I agree your points are quite valid and make me question my position.

I have to ask Charles, why are you still holding SIRI shares if you believe everything you are saying?

From what I gather, you believe Sirius may very well be gone in the coming years due to competition and lack of quality management?

[TSavery]

Sirius XM has some distinct advantages that CAN make them be a powerful player for years to come:

1. Brand recognition

2. Live talk, sports, and news

3. Dual delivery systems......satellites as well as the net.

Sirius XM CAN become as important a player on the net as Slacker and Pandora. They CAN become even better than those services because they CAN replicate what those services do, AND have the advantages above.

The issue is whether Sirius XM shifts form CAN to DOES. If they don't, they could be in for trouble one day.

The future of Sirius XM could well be that it is more of an Internet delivery than a satellite delivery model. It is conceivable that the satellite constellations (at least with the current capabilities) will be secondary in the near future. Perhaps the next sats will have streaming internet capability.

[relmor2003]

It's six hours per station. The Portable can hold 15-40 stations, You can customize the stations to your tastes.

That said, for a three day fishing trip I would probably bring my Stiletto along. Last time I went on a cruise I brought the Stiletto along so I could hear CNBC on deck. But guess what, at night in the cabin, I relaxed to the Slacker Portable.

I can appreciate both. It not an "OR" situation

Ahh. Ok, now its a mp3 player market. Different market. Your right though, thats decent time.

[TSavery]

This is how Slacker does and does not compete. I think this illustrates what Slacker is quite nicely:



This is how Slacker describes themselves in the world of audio entertainment. Note that there is overlap between the various types of services.

[relmor2003]

This is how Slacker does and does not compete. I think this illustrates what Slacker is quite nicely:



This is how Slacker describes themselves in the world of audio entertainment. Note that there is overlap between the various types of services.

Thats a cute chart. Its also a straw man arguement. Why? Because...You ignore my content and variance and delivery arguements, and focus on personalization.That chart is has 3 categories.
1.Personalized music. This would be a music preference.
2.Everywhere. Accessibility of your choice of music.
3.Effortlessly. How easy is it to use. So this would be a mechanical point. Based on music.

This chart, as it was created by Slacker, to show you the strengths of Slacker, and the weaknesses of Sirius. Now if the chart had these 3 categories in it, how do you think Slacker would do.

1. Orginial content.
2. Variance of entertaiment.
3. Delivery of entertainment.

1. Slacker would not be in this bubble at all.
2. Slacker would be out of this bubble completely as well.
3. Here they would get some play. They can post of good coverage, and mulitple ways of listening. SiriusXM offers the ultimate delivery. Live, updated to the second, sports, news, weather, and special services with an almost unlimited coverage area. Now with the Iphone app, you can listen to it almost everywhere.
MP3 should not be in that bubble. If you do, you need to add boom box, tape deck, cd player, ipod, zune, and a hundred other individual devices that simply PLAY music. It should simply say a music player, that does not personalize like a radio(pandora..etc...)
SiriusXM is personalized as well. THey have a ton of pure artist stations, and multiple genres covered, with a much larger music library. And if their album debuts, im not hearing it first on Slacker. Slacker is simply inferior is everyway except you can think your having more control over what you listen too. When its really just a poor lazy excuse for loading up your mp3 player. Because thats all it is, a glorified mp3 player, that makes it convienient to hear music. Different market. Doestn compete with SIriusXM anymore than a cd player does.