It's probably because Stern has pretty much kept the company afloat. According to this article he's responsible for something like $390m of revenue, meaning he's made them almost $1 billion over the time he's been with Sirius.

It's also their own fault for signing shitty contracts. It's sad to hear them bitch about their manager but never fire him.

I wish more people would focus on this. Even if they're joking around a bit, if they have the #2 show on Sirius, they sure as hell aren't treated as such and that comes from their contacts and their agent.

Jay Thomas has the same agent as Howard Stern, and his Don Buchwald negotiation stories are pretty impressive. He said the guy put in his contract he would get paid double if the pilot of Love and War ended up being an hour long and ended up getting paid double what any of the other actors made, plus, part of his deal was that he would get paid the same amount as the highest paid actor. Jay said he thought it was crazy to push for all of that, but Buchwald got everything in his contract.

Using the basic subscription price of $13 per month, or $156 per year, Stern loyalists account for gross annual revenue of between $312 million and $390 million, respectively. Sirius banks about 60 percent of that revenue, which means that Stern is directly responsible for between $187 million and $234 million of Sirius XM's bottom line. Using those figures, Stern has generated between $935 million and $1.2 billion in revenue for Sirius XM since the signing of his original contract.

And that article was written 3.5 years ago.

And?

There's no denying that Stern generated $1 billion in revenue for SXM. Even if his listenership declined by, say 50%, he's still generating over $500m.

I love the show, love O&A, etc etc yada yada, but there's no way in hell they're generating that kind of cash.

...wat?

We're making the same point, I was just clarifying your point further with a quote from the article you posted.

Ah, ok, sorry. I thought you were trying to say that it being written 3.5 years ago made less valid.

Didn't he sue them for about that much though?

He tried to sue them for $300m but a judge dismissed it. He appealed and lost.

Hes an insecure jew and he has sirius/xm by the balls. Youre talking about a guy who sued the company for hundreds of millions of dollars and they still threw him a gigantic party.

Yeah what a Jew right guys?!!

I love how they talk every day about a guy they can't talk about.

Howard owns his content. He is sirius' biggest draw. OnA have to suck the corporate dick because in the end they don't own their material. Like any of it. At all. That's why no WNEW stuff replayed, or KROCK (good or bad). And if they ever were to move on (they won't, too much risk and motivation needed) you'll never hear the sirius xm stuff either. Sex for Sam still effects their careers immensely. When that contract was up they would have been likely able to own their own content, and run their "business" more like Howard.

They own the krock stuff I think. Sam told opie they did I believe some time in feb

They couldn't write a book because that'd require work and effort. You're kidding yourself if you think it's because of Howard.

Seriously.

Where did you hear about them not being able to write a book because of him?

Today's show

"We were gonna write the book, but we had to write about Howard, and Mel Karmazin would have fired us." - Opie

That was really all they said about Howard and writing a book.

After the merger Stern would have had more power over them as the company have always seen him as a big 'get' and one of their flagship shows. Plus, it was less of a merger and more of a buyout (I believe).

Before Stern joined Sirius, XM would have likely been courting him a little so any provocation from the boys would have gone against his chances of signing up.

Why he had power be he joined Sirius and before the merger is anybody's guess.

Howard Stern pulled about 30x more listeners than O&A had when they both signed up for satellite and O&A could say anything they wanted (and did) on XM and K-Rock you dumb fuck.

Really? 'Cause THEY are saying otherwise.

Time of the month for you, mate? Here's to hoping you get cervical cancer.

I would be shocked if they said they were banned from talking about Howard Stern on XM or K-Rock, because they did talk about him. They were competing with him. They worked for different companies. There are clips on Youtube that you can listen to.

They were banned from talking about him at WNEW during the year 2000, and they obviously are allowed to talk about him on SiriusXM.

You see the interview on Hannity where Stern admitted that he had Mel ban O&A from talking about/even mentioning the name "Howard Stern" because he said "90% of their content involves me. I wanted to see if they could do a show without me." Opie might exaggerate a lot of shit and he surely held/holds onto this grudge longer than necessary but the part about not being allowed to talk about Stern for a good chunk of time under threat of termination was true. Even Howie admitted that.

Yes, that's the only part that's true. But you know how long that lasted? Two years.

So O&A still complain about this weird two year year period in 2000-2002 while they both worked for Infinity where they couldn't talk about Howard. But they act like he ruined their careers, meanwhile they've stolen bits from him.

I don't think they've ever conceded that their careers were "ruined." From what I can tell they are pretty proud of their careers as they often refer to their show as one of the, if not the best radio shows of its kind. They did have a legitimate gripe. Howard was the biggest free speech champion of the 90s/early 2000s. He was constantly speaking out against the FCC and fighting for his right not to be censored. It was a tremendous contribution to radio (and all of broadcasting for that matter). It is certainly worth noting that when he then turns around and has his "competition" censored it is extremely hypocritical. The guy got extremely rich and famous because he was tremendously talented on the radio but as soon as he got the chance/felt like it would benefit him, he used that wealth, fame, and influence to get other people in his industry censored.

Really, is that what happened? Do you even know what caused Stern to ban them from talking about him and his show?

According to Howard they were talking about him so much that he felt that he was their only source of content and he wanted to see if they could provide a show without talking about him. That is Howard's own words. I'll take his word over O&A's on that but it doesn't matter what the reason was. He used his popularity/ad power to coerce management to censor a smaller show.

That's Howard being glib and trying to shit on O&A when he says that. O&A played "a joke" on Stern by ruining a week long bit he was doing, and Stern played "a joke" on O&A by banning them from talking about him or his show.

And of course he had management censor them. They fucked with him and he slapped them down. I can't think of a single person I've worked with that would be okay with some new guy just coming along and fucking with his or her job. And if you don't believe me, go get a job and then get on the top performing person's computer and delete a week of their Outlook calendar. It'll be hilarious.

If you are referring to Howard being bummed out about the secret concert ticket giveaway thing being spoiled by O&A, Howard having them banned from talking about him after that is definitely a crybaby response. They are in the entertainment business. What happened resulted in entertaining radio. The reason he didn't say that's why he had them censored during the Hannity interview is because that would make him look like a real pussy. That is why he said "Their whole show is based on me so I want to see what they can do without mentioning me."

Also, trying to compare what they do for a living to a normal job doesn't work. I can't have a girl come into my place of employment, get naked, and throw bologna at her ass. Howard thought it was hilarious when his fans were fuckin with live news broadcasts screaming Baba Booey or calling news networks to prank call them, or sending Stuttering John to press conferences to interfere etc. (which is fuckin with other peoples' jobs) but he, apparently, has less of a sense of humor about his own job being "fucked with." That's another example of hypocrisy.

The bottom line is "The King of Free Speech" can't resort to censorship of a fellow broadcaster to fix his problems without looking like a hypocrite.

He's not a martyr or some sort of altruistic idealist and his career and brand aren't a joke to him. He jokes around and does a comedic act, but it's a job to him that he's serious about. He's worked 3-4 jobs for most of his career. It's hard to convey that type A mindset to someone that doesn't get it.

Crybaby, hypocrite, boo hoo. Big deal, grow up and welcome to the big leagues. There are a lot of careers and businesses you can be in where you'll have people from 18 to 80 trying to fuck with you any way they know how, and you can either compete or not.

Great. But you can also have principles along the way and not be a hypocrite is all I'm saying. Having a career without using your power in the industry to prohibit your competition from saying anything damaging about you doesn't make you a martyr. The guy didn't wanna be fucked with so he took the easy way out. That's fine. He had management on his side so it was within his power to do that. That does make him a pussy though.

Also I never said his career or brand are jokes but he's a guy that threw bologna at girls' asses, had drunk midgets do trivia challenges, handcuffed girls to a fat slob for 48 hours to win prize money, and a million other funny but ridiculous bits. He is closer to Homer Simpson than Oscar Wilde so lets not take morning radio so seriously that he is beyond criticism.

You and a decent subset of O&A fans just eat up Opie's bullshit when it comes to management and Howard Stern. Howard Stern has nothing to do with O&A. Not only is it pathetic that they even complain about him, but Howard Stern has spent less than 1/10th of the time talking about O&A over the years that Opie has spent talking about Stern. Howard’s transcripts and shows are all online, you can check it out.

Howard’s not “protected” or a little baby, and SXM don’t have it out for O&A while loving Stern – the guy makes 20x what O&A make AND owns all of his material and gets to take it with him. It’s like that doesn’t even register with you idiots. It’s the equivalent of a guy making $50k and another guy making $1 mill and the $50k guy complaining that the other guy gets preferential treatment – yeah, no shit. You guys act like everything is fucking arbitrary or that these people in management that are more educated and experienced than you are just a bunch of idiots.

calm down fella.

His right though. Enough with the Stern shit. Opie should be ashamed to be a man in his 40's and still talk about the big boy all the time.

Opie is in his 50s.

Mid 50's. How the hell is Fez the second youngest guy on old 202?

Hes exactly 50.

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Yea, I agree. I stopped listening to Stern this time last year and haven't thought about him or his show in forever. I think Opie needs to GET OVER IT!

yes... i was first turned on to the whole thing with O and A on letterman saying they hate stern ... but scowering clip after clip i got the impression from howard robin and artie's point of view there was no "radio war" .. in fact they rarely mentioned the O&A show

How does Hoo hoo's ass taste?

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He won't for long.. not doing shows = losing a lot of your audience.

Like I said I wasn't comparing the two shows or their successes. I'm talking about why Howard asked Mel to send out that gag order and his insecure actions towards O&A

He had them gagged like 14 years ago, and it only lasted two years. And he did it because O&A fucked with him and he could do it. Blaming Howard and management is a radio bit and a crutch for them at this point, particularly Opie.

calm down fella.

Mid 50's. How the hell is Fez the second youngest guy on old 202?

How does Hoo hoo's ass taste?

I wish more people would focus on this. Even if they're joking around a bit, if they have the #2 show on Sirius, they sure as hell aren't treated as such and that comes from their contacts and their agent.

yes... i was first turned on to the whole thing with O and A on letterman saying they hate stern ... but scowering clip after clip i got the impression from howard robin and artie's point of view there was no "radio war" .. in fact they rarely mentioned the O&A show