Stern's Out-of-this-World Achievement Makes the Press Crazy

According to the LA Times, "only a small fraction" of Howard Stern's audience have joined him at Sirius.

Sirius now has four million subscribers. Up from 600,000 when Stern announced he'd be joining the satellite radio outfit. I'm being less than generous when I suggest say well over three million of those subscribers listen to Stern's show at some point in the day. Stern's show has been run on an almost endless loop on Howard 100, one of his two stations, since late March.

That's an audience of three million from the twelve million he left at terrestrial radio. That's AT LEAST 25% of his audience. 1/4. Hardly a small fraction.

Imagine if 1/4 of Seinfeld's audience paid to see his same show uncensored and on cable. The media would bronze John Stewart's balls and present them live to Jerry in place of the next Super Bowl.

As far as the Times' central question of its article "Where have the Stern fans gone?" I'd say the answer is nowhere. They are either considering joining, listening to tapes or in the process of joining Sirius when they get a new car. Carolla, Roth, NPR? There is no alternative.

Here's an easy prediction: Sirius will have well over twelve million subscribers by the time Stern's initial Sirius contract is up.

No doubt then the media will be saying something like: It took five years for Stern to rebuild his terrestrial radio audience. What took him so long?

And the shows will still be so good that the fans will be asking themselves the same thing.