The planned merger between XM and Sirius could mean the end of 24 hour folk music programming on satellite radio in the US.

Sirus shut down its FolkTown channel in 2005 and its chairman Mel Karmazin will be running the new combined company when and if the merger goes through. He's on record as saying that it's not cost effective to retain musical genres not believed to appeal to younger demographics. XM's Folk Village could eventually be either discontinued or combined with other niche music channels such as bluegrass and blues.