The king of all lawsuits
Howard Stern is an enigma. An intelligent and articulate man, he uses all of his considerable powers of expression to put words around every adolescent males' fantasies. He's a popular guy.
Stern jumped to Sirius radio recently for a reported $220 million contract. Now he's being sued by CBS for doing so.
But there's more at stake here than lesbian strippers or dwarf spanking or bologna slapping; it's about the future of media.
Broadcast or narrowcast? Federal content control or unregulated content?
These are way more significant questions. It will be interesting to see if any of this comes out in the suit.
If Stern is successful, then pay radio, as we know it now, is effectively dead.
There's the money, sure. There's also the freedom. More importantly, there's the development of a targeted audience who is willing to pay a premium for specialized content. That model is highly replicatable and is the future of satellite broadcasting.
Unlike cable television, this change will be quick and abrupt. The content is already there. The switch to satellite from broadcast is about removing restrictions, rather than developing content.
bababoie.
Posted on March 01, 2006
