XM Radio Pulls a Netflix on Its Subscribers

XM Radio seems to be following the disastrous customer relations strategy executed last year by Netflix. Last week, it shifted its folk music channel, The Village, from satellite to Internet-only and decided to charge customers more for this "upgrade."

In case you missed it, Netflix last September decided to separate its streaming service from its DVD-by-mail service and charge more for both, an exercise that saw subscribers defect en masse and its stock tank. The move ultimately resulted in company CEO Reed Hastings reversing course, saying, "I messed up. I owe everyone an explanation."

Like Netflix, XM Radio has tried to pitch its shift of The Village to Internet-only as an improvement. When the folk channel disappeared from the XM channel lineup I called Customer Care (Note to readers: Any company that has an operation called Customer Care probably does not care) and was told that this was an "upgrade," one for which I would have to fork over an extra $3.50 a month.

This purported upgrade would do nothing for me when I want to listen to The Village in my car -- unless I want to unspool miles of Ethernet cable as I drive along New Mexico's highways and byways.

XM Radio did not even bother to explain this switch to its 20 million plus subscribers, who pay $200 bucks year to listen to satellite radio, not Internet radio.

I found out The Village had been killed off when I tried to tune in last Thursday and was automatically shunted off to the Korea Today channel, a shift that made my head hurt.

Who knows, maybe XM Radio administrators found an obscure doctoral thesis that revealed that people who like Woody Guthrie, Tom Paxton, Joan Baez and Judy Collins also really love all things Korean.

XM Radio subscribers reacted quickly and angrily online, with over 2,500 comments posted on the XM Radio Village Facebook page. Subscribers also have started an online petition to restore The Village to the over 200 channel XM satellite lineup, which, after all, has enough room for a 24/7 Pearl Jam channel.

The Federal Communications Commission also might want to take a look into this too, as in 2008 it approved the merger of XM Radio with its rival Sirius into the monopoly Sirius XM Radio Inc., which now controls all the satellite radio channels in the country.

If true competition existed in the satellite radio market, I have a feeling that subscribers would not have been treated so cavalierly.