Stern already inked one of the most lucrative radio deals in the business when he abandoned terrestrial radio for Sirius Satellite radio in 2005. He has an incentive-laden deal tied to Sirius subscriber growth. The original first year prediction was for 3.5 million subscribers which Stern would be paid a bonus if more than two million more subscribers hit before year end. This type of deal guaranteed he’d be working hard to promote Sirius to listeners. Sirius ended the year with a little over 6 million subscribers, two of which, as mentioned in the last post are in our household.

Sirius and XM shares have also shed more than 40 percent of their value in the last year, compared with a 10 percent rise in the Standard & Poor’s 500 Index, with investor concerns ranging from the ability to meet new subscriber targets to a weak retail sector.

Sirius also offers subscribers the ability to listen to Howard’s show (Howard 100 and Howard 101) via internet streaming in a lower quality bandwidth, but it’s listenable at no additional charge. For those who want to kick in a couple extra bones they can get a higher quality stream.

Not sure I agree with Stern’s prediction of 30-40 million subscribers in a couple years, but if you like to listen to radio, Sirius is great. I haven’t compared to XM but I’ve heard and read in the comments area here that XM is good too.

Update 1/10/07 11:59pm PST: Changed title from 83 million to 82.9.