Is FM radio dead?

To be honest, I never thought I'd pay for radio. That changed a few years ago when my company car came with XM radio in it. Since I generally had some serious windshield time, I sprung for the $12.95 per month. Within a very short while, I was hooked. Between being able to listen to CNBC live and having a number of very good music channels, it was great. Especially out here in Montana where radio reception stinks much of the time.

Over time as the 2008 presidential race heated up in 2007, XM produced a show called POTUS08. That programming was fantastic with plenty of live coverage of events, neutral reporting and really what I always thought unbiased political broadcasting was supposed to be. After the election, my interest in politics waned and POTUS changed their focus from Presidential politics to Politics in general. My point being, here was excellent news information and it didn't matter where I was, my XM radio worked and I got the same station essentially uninterrupted. During this time, I picked up a second radio, a Audiovox Xpress. With this radio, I setup a docking station at work and a dock in my truck. Having the second radio required me to pay about $3 more per month, but it was worth it.

More recently, a friend of mine, turned me on to Pandora. I had known about the music genome project for years, but never followed it nor did I know what ever became of it. Well, this is mondo cool! I can build my own radio stations based on what kind of music I like and listen to different stations based on my mood. Moreover, I don't have to bother with buying MP3's or CD's or anything like that, I don't have to worry about DRM or ownership of the music. For the most part, all of the headaches associated with digital music are removed. Now it gets even cooler... There is a app for my Blackberry to play my Pandora stations. That means anywhere I get cellular, my music stations go with me. I can sync my Blackberry with my skiing helmet via bluetooth and jam without having to have an iPod and cords or a lot of other complications. I can listen in the car via a 3.5mm cable or bluetooth. Basically, this just works.

And Pandora gets smarter about your tastes over time. You can like/dislike selected songs and then using the music genome algorithms, it adjusts your play list. So, I really do have a Pink Floyd-Led Zeppelin radio station and it mostly plays Pink Floyd or Led Zeppelin tunes. How cool is that?

Now, back to terrestrial FM radio. For years, I avoided listening to Clear Channel radio stations as I felt I needed to patronize local radio stations or they would become a thing of the past. So when I did listen to local radio, which was usually only when I was home in Billings, I listened to my local favorite station, KRKX, Montana's home of rock 'n roll. They were owned until very recently by Cherry Creek Radio, which while they are a national station owner, they have a very local flavor to their stations. Unfortunately, Cherry Creek decided to exit the Billings market and sell the stations they owned here. The new buyers of the station promptly fired all of the staff and are now playing CARTs of play lists. So tell me, what difference is there between this and Pandora except with Pandora, I choose the playlist?

I'm sad to see it come to this, but I think other than maybe NPR, public broadcast radio is gone. I've moved on and am happier for the move. What about you?