If you're new here, you may want to subscribe to my RSS feed. If you have any questions, please see my policies page or if you would like to contact me, you can do so here. You can find out more about me here. I sincerely thank you for visiting!

It wasn’t three days ago that I voiced jubilation at the fact that Mel Karmazin had said that price freezes would be in order for the XM-Sirius merger and that I was all for the merger with my last hesitation being overcome.

Well, not so fast. Kevin Martin, the current chairman of the FCC and the likely deciding vote on the merger, was interviewed by the NY Times in today’s article and shed some light on what Mr. Karmazin really meant.

As he sought to sell the proposed merger of Sirius Satellite Radio and XM Satellite Radio to Congress, and by extension to regulators like Mr. Martin, Mel Karmazin, the chief executive of Sirius, vowed last Wednesday that prices would not be raised and that listeners would benefit enormously by getting the best programming from both companies.

But in separate conversations with two people after Mr. Karmazin’s testimony to a House committee, Mr. Martin said that subscribers may be surprised to learn they may actually have to pay more than the current monthly rate of $12.95 if, for example, they want to receive all the games of Major League Baseball (now available only on XM) as well as all the professional football games (now only on Sirius).

Mr. Karmazin, reached on Tuesday, said his testimony was not misleading and that he meant to say two things: subscribers wanting to keep their existing service would not face a price increase, and listeners who wanted the best of both services would pay less than the combined rate of $25.90.

Whoa, wait a goshdarn minute. You were telling us that we would not pay more than we are currently paying, which is $12.95/month. Now, it’s we won’t pay more than the combined $25.90?

Mr. Karmazin is scheduled to appear before a second Congressional panel on Wednesday.

In the interview on Tuesday afternoon, he said he thought he had been clear that to get the best of both XM and Sirius, consumers would have to pay more than the monthly rate of $12.95, but less than the combined rate of $25.90. Consumers who just want to stay with their existing lineup would be guaranteed the same price, he said.

I won’t pay $25.90/mo (actually more because we have multiple radios) when I can plug my iPod in instead (there I helped your argument). Don’t tell us prices will be frozen and imply that we’ll get both services when that’s not the case. Tell us what the rates will be now instead of playing around and coming out with a $25.89/mo price point after the merger is approved.

I’ve now seriously cooled on the merger. Frankly, I’m not sure that I’ll trust them the rest of the way to tell us the truth if this main tenet of the merger can be so easily spun. I love my XM, but I have zero tolerance for companies that lie to me and I could easily live without my XM radio. I’m watching closely and will continue to watch and see. But right now, I’m not happy.