XM Suspends Opie & Anthony over comments

[Danger Ranger]

WASHINGTON and NEW YORK, May 15 /PRNewswire-FirstCall/ -- XM Radio announced today that the company has suspended Gregg "Opie" Hughes and Anthony Cumia, hosts of "The Opie & Anthony Show" and ceased broadcast of the show for 30 days, effective immediately.

XM Radio deplored the comments aired on "The Opie & Anthony Show" last week. At the time, the company strongly expressed its views to Opie and Anthony, and they issued an immediate apology.

Comments made by Opie and Anthony on yesterday's broadcast put into question whether they appreciate the seriousness of the matter. The management of XM Radio decided to suspend Opie and Anthony to make clear that our on-air talent must take seriously the responsibility that creative freedom requires of them.

xmradio.mediaroom.com/index.php?s=press_releases&item=1452

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The management of XM Radio decided to suspend Opie and Anthony to make clear that our on-air talent must take seriously the responsibility that creative freedom requires of them.

XM is certainly free to run their business the way they want to, but just once, I'd love to see some honesty in these press releases. Somebody must explain to me how creative freedom and suspended for exercising such belong in the same sentence.

O&A will probably never return to the XM airwaves. The model for this was molded with the Imus firing. 1) Force an on-air apology 2) Follow a few days later with a suspension 3) A few days later fire the offenders.

As Imus was with CBS radio, O&A are one of XM's highest rated native shows. I think the bloodbath going on in nationally syndicated radio is a very short sighted business decision that will affect the bottom line of the companies involved.

As for XM, the entire selling point was the unconstrained nature of no government oversight, and what does XM do? They fold like a cheap suit the first time a bunch of hot air gets blown their way. Nice going guys. XMSR at close: down $.26

[tcrashfx]

I am sick of all this PC crap. I am going to boycott any media outlet that fires, demotes, suspends (Or even looks sideway at) any person because of what they SAY or how they SAY IT!

Good grief. Are we becoming that thin skinned that no one can take a compilations of WORDS?

[Felix]

To slightly jack this thread, I noticed on MSNBC this morning two familiar faces from the cancelled Imus show. I don't remember their last names, but Charles, the news reader, and Chris, who comments on sports, were both on with David Gregory this morning.

MSNBC has been rotating hosts on the show since Imus was fired. Gregory, an NBC White House correspondent, had been a frequent guest on Imus's show.

[Danger Ranger]

Wait and see....both XM and CBS radio will suffer financially from these poor decisions.

CBS radio is a no-brainer....Imus was far and away their biggest single source of revenue. And scattered reports are that wait times to cancel XM is 1-3 hrs, and then you are met with bribes of three months of free service not to cancel. The bribes are now being taken advantage of by non O&A fans who got wind that XM was doling out free service and started calling in to cancel in order to get the free service offer. Trojan condoms pulled their ads from XM due to the comments of O&A (is it just me, or isn't that mighty uppity for a company that makes rubbers?) and Nashville Coffee pulled theirs in support of O&A, with rumors of others ready to jump ship due to the heavy handedness of XM's treatment of their marquee act.

I expect CBS Radio to act in an ivory tower, mightier than thou manner, but XM's move is beyond disappointing. This move is going to cost them millions. Millions in lost revenue, lost subscriptions, free service, and just the general ill will of its customer base. And what makes it so f'ing stupid is that the people who were the most vocal and most offended....get this....don't subscribe to XM! So, lets the do the math....XM just pissed off about a million of it's customers, doled out several thousand months of free service (and still counting), lost two advertisers, with more getting ready to jump ship. Had they done nothing and let it ride, they would have lost a single, easily replaced advertisers. Do these guys not have calculators?

Aside from all of that, the precedent is being set that anyone who is somehow offended by what they hear can simply have the offender removed from the airwaves, and that my friends, is total bullshit.