Stern no satélite; aumenta a "piratice"

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"Illicit downloading of shock jock Howard Stern's shows increased fivefold Thursday after the Los Angeles Times reported on the broad availability of bootlegged versions of his Sirius Satellite Radio program on Internet file-sharing networks.

"The genie's out of the bottle," said Aram Sinnreich, managing partner of Radar Research, a Los Angeles media consulting firm.In 2004, Sirius hired Stern on a five-year, $500-million contract in hopes of wooing new subscribers to its $12.95-a-month satellite radio service. He helped deliver more than a million new subscribers before he even took to the microphone Jan. 9.

But almost immediately, pirate radio stations in New York and New Jersey began rebroadcasting the show on unclaimed FM radio frequencies, and websites began streaming it online without permission.

Sirius was quick to take legal action and, in an ironic twist, to seek help from Stern's longtime nemesis, the Federal Communications Commission.

Internet file-sharing sites, which allow potentially millions of computer users around the globe to exchange audio recordings, represent a challenge that comes as no surprise to Sirius. In recent Securities and Exchange Commission filings, the company acknowledged that piracy could "harm our business."

The extent of that harm is still not fully known. Mark Ishikawa, chief executive of BayTSP, a Los Gatos, Calif., company that monitors online piracy for the entertainment industry, described the surge in downloads Thursday as "waking the sleeping giant."

"Ilicit Downloading of Stern's Show Soars Fivefold", LA Times, 3/2/06, By Dawn C. Chmielewski, Times Staff Writer