Rick Henderson got XM Satellite Radio for Christmas, and seems to be enjoying it. Even with my “mainstream” musical tastes, I prefer XM to the horrible spot load (radio jargon for number of commercials per hour) and lack of variety of mainstream radio—and judging from the number of satellite radio antennas I’m seeing in Oxford these days, I’m not alone.

Anyway, XM is going to neutralize one of the few advantages its rival Sirius has by removing commercials from 68 of its 70 music channels on February 1st (many of which were already commercial-free—the only “commercially impaired” channels are Viacom’s MTV Radio and VH-1 Radio); now that all of XM’s radio programming is in-house with the launch of Kiss-XM (replacing the incredibly-spot-infested Kiss-FM of Los Angeles), it’s a smart move, as ads really weren’t selling on the music channels. Also cool, if you live in a real city, is the launch of local traffic and weather starting in March. And, last but not least, MSNBC will be added to the dial, so you can get your daily dose of Olbermann or (ick) Imus. All very cool.

Not a paid endorsement—I just love my XM. No more fiddling with CDs or listening to Let Go a thousand times, over and over and over…