Content Matters

It's not surprising that the radio industry are following the lead of their brethren in the music industry, when it comes to protecting their broken business models.
After the long, protracted process under which the Department of Justice finally acknowledged that combining XM and Sirius does not constitute a monopoly, the deal now goes to the FCC for review.

Clear Channel has apparently submitted a list of recommendations for the FCC to impose upon satellite radio as conditions for the deal's approval. At the top of the list: application of radio decency rules to be applied to satellite radio.  As Engadget points out, that's the equivalent of requiring HBO to follow the requirements of broadcast television.

Henry Blodget argues that the FCC has outlived its usefulness and is just getting in the way.

After more than 15 months, this deal looks like it may finally get approved. Far from a monopoly, this deal now looks like it brings together two floundering, bit players in a highly competitive space. In addition to terrestrial radio, they will be competing with HD radio, iPods and all the emerging web technologies like internet radio (e.g. last fm), social networks such as MySpace and the music blogs. At the same time, as Google, Yahoo and Microsoft focus on local search, that will also eat into the revenues of terrestrial radio. Meanwhile, if the traditional players like Clear Channel want to effectively defend their turf, they should stop focusing on the legal tactics and give some thought to putting out a compelling product.