It needs to be a tribe.

Instead of running Oprah’s new TV network, Tom Freston should be in charge of resuscitating Sirius XM.  Because he was there when MTV blew up as a result of the "I Want My MTV!" campaign!

FM radio was biggest when it was a club.  The station filled all your needs.  Not only  musical, but informational too.  The deejay was the ringleader, the news was alternative, it felt like being in a room with the Little Rascals.  You knew about the shows coming to town, you knew the new tunes, you BELONGED!

All that is gone on Sirius XM.  The growth of the service, the buzz, is history.  What they’ve got now is a replication of what’s on the FM band, but sans commercials.  With all the research they’ve done, don’t they realize people hate terrestrial radio and are tuning it out?  Why?  Because of the short playlists, the endless repetition and the jive deejays.  All of which have been transferred to most Sirius XM channels.  It’s hard to spread the word on the service, because not only do most people not want to pay for radio, those that ARE paying are PISSED!

Satellite radio isn’t going to be sold by the media.  It’s going to be sold by its fans.  Until the fans are motivated to spread the word, Sirius XM is screwed.

Where’s the Sirius XM social network?  Where are the bumper stickers, quoting Howard Stern?

NOW is the time to play up the Howard angle.  When we’ve got a vast wasteland in the mainstream and Howard is better than ever.  Where’s the site with Howard clips, other interactive features to grow his presence and audience?

As for music…

Do we really need to hear "Won’t Get Fooled Again" on Classic Vinyl?  Certain tracks NEVER need to be played again.  What gets a listener motivated is when he hears something that jogs his memory, that he wasn’t expecting.  Instead of analyzing tune-outs, the team at Sirius XM should be analyzing TUNE-INS!  What makes people fire up the service, what makes them keep subscribing?  You can’t live on fear.  You’ve got to be focused on growth, not loss.

No more cliches.  No more stupid bumpers.  If satellite radio is not hip and different, not an exotic club that you feel proud to be a member of, it’s got no future.

Sure, there are economics involved.  But the key element of Sirius XM’s survival is the programming.  And too much of it is repetitive, without hooks.

Where’s the stunting on Sirius XM?  The type of event that built MTV, but is absent on satellite?  Like giving away an artist’s house, or allowing a fan to be a roadie or…

It’s about buzz more than superstardom.

I love satellite radio.  It’s light years better than any computerized service.  But it’s got a bad image and now the programming is too mediocre on too many stations.  It’s like they’re living in the twentieth century.  There’s no hipness, no edge.

They’re doomed unless they motivate and involve their audience.