On yesterday's third quarter earnings conference call, SiriusXM's outgoing CEO Mel Karmazin took a shot at personalized Internet radio services such as Pandora. Billboard.biz notes that Karmazin did not mention Pandora, or any other service, by name, but said that such companies are in a "race to the bottom in terms of business model." He continued, "those companies which can grow users and provide good customer experience usually have the worst business models." Karmazin added that to fix their business models, such companies require "a whole lot more commercials, and that means harming the customer's experience."

However, SiriusXM is moving ahead with its own personalized online music service, which it hopes to launch by the end of 2012. Karmazin said the satcaster is launching the service, "not because we think it's good business," but because their customers wanted it, according to Billboard.biz.

As reported yesterday, SiriusXM's revenue was up in the third quarter of the year by 14 percent to $867 million from Q3 2011's revenue of $763 million. However, net income fell from $104 million to $75 million, including a loss on extinguishment of debt of $107 million in the third quarter of 2012.  Adjusted EBITDA for the third quarter of 2012 was $245 million, up 24 percent from $197 million a year ago.

Karmazin announced last month that he will step down as CEO of SiriusXM, effective February 1, 2013.