For a really long time, I was very anti-Satellite radio. Why pay for something when you can get it for free? I just couldn’t understand why somebody would do such a thing!

When the head unit in my car stereo went out on my old car, I thought about upgrading to an HD Radio unit but couldn’t justify the cost of it … so I went with an HD Radio-ready unit just in case I wanted to upgrade. Luckily for me, only a few months later I bought a new car that had Sirius Satellite Radio pre-installed. At first, I was still kind of iffy on it, and being from Chicago, I had my favorite radio station, The Mix … and when I don’t have my Sirius, I definitely turn them on, but they had been doing this stupid social experiment, and that’s when I turned off over-the-air radio for good.

The choices that Sirius (and I’m going to be Sirius heavy here because I have never subscribed/used XM Radio) offers are amazing. Mainly, I listen to the music and talk stations as my two main staples. There’s a wide variety of point of views, from liberal left to radical right … and they seem to get along. Even the gay/lesbian station invites Fr. Dave from the Catholic channel on from time to time.

And for a number of months, there has been talk about an acquisition of XM by Sirius. Personally, I’m in support of the merger. While I’m not a share holder and therefore don’t have any say in the matter, CNN reports that shareholders of both have approved the acquisition to continue. Now, the only thing that can stand in the way is the U.S. Government … hopefully, it won’t be too bumpy for the two, but who knows. We’ll definitely see how it will play out.

I am very excited to see the combination of resources to focus on programming choice and flexibility of subscriptions rather than competition and customer retainment. From the same CNN article, it appears as if there has already been some preliminary discussion of the future choices that may be offered. You have Sirius, here, for a little more, pick some of XM and vice versa. Personally, I can’t see this going on for too long before they’re merged into one force. Why maintain two separate staffs, etc … But for my two cents, as little as they’re worth, I’m glad to see the acquisition move onto the next step. I know that Sirius has made a committed customer out of me (for now), so let’s see the service only get better!

Editor’s Note: Greg Probst is the author of Blue Sleeves Blog and is a regular contributor to Probstisms.