NEW YORK, Jan 29, 2007 — SIRIUS Satellite Radio, the Official Satellite Radio Partner of NASCAR, announced today that Juan Pablo Montoya, the former Formula One star who will drive the No. 42 Texaco/Havoline Dodge in the NASCAR NEXTEL Cup and NASCAR Busch Series in 2007 for Chip Ganassi Racing with Felix Sabates, will participate weekly in an exclusive interview spot heard only on SIRIUS NASCAR Radio, the new 24/7 year-round radio channel dedicated to NASCAR.

Starting January 29, Montoya will be heard every Monday on SIRIUS Speedway, the exclusive talk show hosted by Dave Moody that airs weekdays (3- 7pm ET) on SIRIUS NASCAR Radio / ch. 128. Montoya, the first F1 driver ever to jump full time into the NASCAR NEXTEL Cup Series, will provide updates on the No. 42 team and comment weekly on his experiences in NASCAR as he transitions from open-wheel racing to stock car racing.

“I’m really excited to be on SIRIUS every week talking to the fans about all my experiences in NASCAR,” said Montoya. “I’m going to have a lot of fun this year, on the racetrack and on the radio.”

“We’re thrilled to welcome an international racing star like Juan Pablo to the SIRIUS NASCAR Radio family and we look forward to his first full season in NASCAR,” said Steve Cohen, SIRIUS’ Vice President of Sports Programming. “Each week our listeners will get first-hand updates on his progress, hear his insights into the differences between open-wheel and stock car racing and get his feedback on all the races.”

Montoya, who is originally from Colombia, raced in Formula One, the pinnacle of open-wheel racing, from 2001 to 2006, compiling seven Grand Prix wins including the sport’s blue ribbon event — the Monaco Grand Prix. Prior to that he drove for Chip Ganassi Racing in the CART series from 1999 to 2000 where he won the CART Championship Series in 1999 as a rookie, and in his first attempt, won the Indianapolis 500 in dominating fashion in 2000. Montoya, 31, decided last year to jump full-time into NASCAR, competing in two ARCA events, four NASCAR Busch Series races and the NASCAR NEXTEL Cup finale at Homestead-Miami Speedway in preparation for a full assault on the Nextel Cup Series in 2007.
SIRIUS is the satellite radio home of every NASCAR NEXTEL Cup Series, NASCAR Busch Series and NASCAR Craftsman Truck Series race. SIRIUS NASCAR Radio, channel 128, which launched January 1, features the races plus exclusive original talk shows with up-to-the-minute news, expert analysis and exclusive interviews with NASCAR insiders.

All NASCAR content is provided to SIRIUS customers at no additional cost over SIRIUS’ monthly subscription fee. For more information visit www.sirius.com.

Oscar winning and Grammy nominated actor and musician Jamie Foxx will executive produce a new channel, called ‘The Foxxhole’, that will focus on Urban music, talk, and comedy. The channel, to be on 106, will include daily short segments from Foxx, as well as a weekly talkshow. There will also be urban comedy bits, sketch shows, as well as music and radio theater. Also serving as executive producer is Marcus King, who has produced many shows and specials, including The Jamie Foxx Show. The Foxxhole will launch this spring, hopefully with more changes in store for us.

The big question this draws is, what will happen to OutQ? Hopefully, it will just be moving to a different place on the map, such as channel 109, which would sandwich it between Maxim and CourtTV. As Sirius’ first 24/7 in-house talk channel, it would be sad if it leaves the airwaves.

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Howard will reportedly be on David Letterman sometime this week. I am still trying to find a date, but CBS announced during a promo during the AFC Championship that Howard will be on.

Update: It is a replay featuring Gwen Stefani, and will be on Thursday night.

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“Deep in the Heart of Texas with Dallas Wayne” features Lone Star State artists

NEW YORK – January 18, 2007 – The best music from Texas can now be heard nationwide every week, in a new SIRIUS Satellite Radio program that showcases established and up-and-coming artists from the Lone Star State.

The new program, Deep in the Heart of Texas with Dallas Wayne, features such Texas music legends as Bob Wills, Ray Price, and Willie Nelson, as well as the latest breaking artists on the Texas scene.

Deep in the Heart of Texas is the place to hear outstanding artists who are known for their Texas roots and sound, including Lefty Frizzell, Dixie Chicks, Jerry Jeff Walker, Joe Ely, Kelly Willis, James McMurtry, Billy Joe Shaver and many more. The show will also feature live performances and artist interviews.

Musician and radio DJ Dallas Wayne hosts the show from the “live music capital of the world,” Austin, Texas, on commercial-free Outlaw Country, channel 63. Deep in the Heart of Texas with Dallas Wayne airs on Saturdays from 8 pm to 12 midnight ET, with a re-broadcast airing on Sundays from 12 midnight to 4 am ET. Created by “Little Steven” Van Zandt, Outlaw Country on SIRIUS is a sanctuary for the freaks, misfits, outcasts, rebels and renegades of country music.

For more information, visit www.sirius.com/outlawcountry.

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According to Lasar’s Letter, an FCC-oriented blog at http://www.lasarletter.net/drupal/ XM has filed a letter with the FCC, in support of a recent Sirius petitiion that requests rules be promulgated to insure that WCS technologies do not interfere with SDARS repeaters. XM appears to be fully backing the Sirius proposal which includes the following points:

• Emission limits be established for DARS repeaters and WCS transmitters. Sirius contends that the firm’s research indicates that interference from WCS transmitters higher than -44 dBM (milliwatt decibels) will block service to satellite radio subscribers.
• DARS and WCS licensees must give advance notice of their equipment rollouts. “Such notice will ensure all licensees have ample opportunity to investigate whether their operations will be affected by the new deployment and request adjustments, in advance, to avoid interference,” Sirius writes.
• Firms be permitted to establish perimeters of an agreed upon size where extra transmitters can be deployed to compensate for interference.

A couple of takeaways from this news…First, remember that at one point XM was trying to buy into WCS, to use that bandwidth to augment their own. Now that the deal has fallen through, they are free to work with Sirius to limit the damage WCS services can do to SDARS broadcasts. Next, this demonstates that even in the absence of a merger, these two companies have plenty to gain by working against common enemies, rather than beating each other up. Finally, it shows that not ALL FCC regulation is bad for SDARS; some of it might even help!

Direct link here

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Many have talked about how it would sure be nice to have a 24 hour news channel available via the online SIR Service. If this channel will be available via the Stiletto is still unconfirmed, but I am assuming since all the other channels are now available via the Stiletto’s Internet Radio, this channel will be made available too. We will keep you posted as we get more information.

Here is a portion of the PR Release:

As of January 16, 2007, CNN now streams online to SIRIUS subscribers 24/7. SIRIUS also broadcasts CNN on its satellite radio channel 132. SIRIUS simulcasts the programming from CNN’s powerful television lineup, featuring shows such as American Morning, The Situation Room, Lou Dobbs Tonight, Paula Zahn Now, Anderson Cooper 360°, and Larry King Live. CNN offers round-the-clock coverage of breaking news and is home to experienced journalists, such as Wolf Blitzer, Dr. Sanjay Gupta, Soledad O’Brien and Miles O’Brien.

UPDATE: 01/18/07 It has been confirmed that CNN will be made available on the Stiletto 100 in the next week or so. This is great news. We hope this is one of many channels that will also be added to the SIR Service and Stiletto (Wifi) Internet Radio.

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From thestreet.com

Shares of Sirius Satellite Radio and rival XM tumbled Wednesday after the chairman of the Federal Communications Commission said agency rules wouldn’t allow the two to merge.

A potential merger of the companies has been the subject of repeated speculation in recent months, but Bloomberg quoted FCC Chairman Kevin Martin as saying that existing regulations prohibit a single owner for the two satellite-ratio operators.

Martin made the comments following an FCC meeting. Sirius was dropping 5.5% to $3.92. XM was slumping 7.6% to $15.83

Thanks MrBroncosfan for the link.

[B]Update: 3:40pm ET[/B]
SIRI: 3.87 (-0.28) XMSR: 15.66 (-1.48)

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Here is a partial guest list of who’s coming to Sirius next week:

JOHN WAITE performance and interview (Big ‘80s / channel 8, Jan. 22 @ 7 am ET)

KATE WHITE, editor, and male celebrity nominees of Cosmopolitan’s 2007 Fun, Fearless Male Awards, live broadcast from Cipriani, NYC (Cosmo Radio / channel 111, Jan. 22 @ 11 am ET)

DR. MARTY GOLDSTEIN, veterinarian (Martha Stewart Living Radio / channel 112, Jan. 22 @ 1 pm ET)

JOHN MELLENCAMP interview and premiere of new album Freedom’s Road (The Spectrum / channel 18, Jan. 22 @ 2 pm ET and Jan. 23 @ 9 pm ET)

JERRY LEE LEWIS World Café performance and interview (SIRIUS Disorder / channel 24, Jan. 22 @ 6 pm ET)

BAM MARGERA’S BACHELOR PARTY, LIVE FROM LAS VEGAS (Radio Bam! on Faction / channel 28, Jan. 22 @ 7 pm ET)

THE WHO in concert, recorded Aug. 27, 2002 in Grand Rapids, MI (The Who Channel / channel 98, Jan. 22 @ 9 pm ET)

TRACIE HOTCHNER, host of Cat Chat (Martha Stewart Living Radio / channel 112, Jan. 23 @ 1 pm ET)

PROJECT PAT guest DJ on Street Certified (Hip-Hop Nation / channel 40, Jan. 23 @ 6 pm ET)

DAMIEN RICE World Café performance and interview (SIRIUS Disorder / channel 24, Jan. 23 @ 6 pm ET)

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The Stiletto 100 ZAP, OS and Baseband upgrade has been released.

How can you get this upgrade: There are two methods: Via Wifi or using the MSS software and USB cable connected to your computer with Internet access. There is a step by step procedure in the following thread in the SBS forum located here.

I found the following issues addressed in this upgrade just from testing it out. (This is not an official list; this is just our list from personal test)

1. When switching from Sat Mode to Wifi Mode, the Sat Chip now turns off, so this resolves the issue with the battery drain some of us were experiencing. No more having to remove the battery or doing a hard restart.

2. When switching docks, we no longer have to remove the battery in order to get sound and the Stiletto no longer freezes up.

3. The SIRIUS Connect issue has also been addressed. I tried switching docks several times in attempted to get this to come up, but it did not. Both the home and car docks have also been updated.

4. Better wifi performance, seems overall that wifi is much more stable.

5. Performance. I noticed the menus aren’t nearly as sluggish, the menus pop up, changing channels is faster and there is no lag. The updated OS apparently cleaned this up.

6. Channel logo’s, wallpaper and voice tags have been updated. One noted specifically was the NASCAR Channel.

7. Last but not least a CLOCK at the bottom middle of the display. This clock takes the place of the Satellite, Internet, Replays, Library tag after about 10 seconds of switching modes. Also when you “LOVE” a song the little heart and the time switch back and fourth. Pretty cool!

There maybe some others, but that is what I have found thus far. We will continue to test and review this upgrade and report our findings. Clearly SIRIUS and ZING are working to make the Stiletto better and better.

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We at Backstage have been saying for some time that OEMs are driving the video project at Sirius.  Today, Dodge announced that they will be offering factory-installed Sirius with video product in it’s 2008 Magnum line.  Regardless of whether you see video as a bandwidth waster, or a dream come true….it’s on it’s way.  Joe promised it, and Mel’s delivering.

PR link.

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