Comcast Again Proclaims All Merger Criticism is 100% Wrong As the FCC comment cycle for Comcast's $45 billion acquisition of Time Warner Cable closed today, top Comcast lobbyist David Cohen once again took to the company's blog to insist that deal critics have it all wrong, and that the Comcast Time Warner Cable merger will only result in positive benefits for consumers and competitors alike. Comcast again cites that the company has a broad coalition of support across many organizations (you're to pretend Comcast gives most of them money to express this position). With a wave of his hand, Cohen dismisses concerns about the fact that Comcast would control 50% of the fixed-line broadband market (more as AT&T and Verizon back away from unwanted DSL and cede these territories to Comcast), potentially opening the door to a broader percentage of usage-capped customers. Cohen also flicks away concerns that three-quarters of Americans lack more than one competitive option at speeds above 25 Mbps: quote: Comcast’s share of any "national" broadband market is not dangerously high and does not increase materially as a result of the transaction. Critics’ assessment of Comcast’s broadband "share" ignores the realities of DSL and wireless competition, and the actual speeds that consumers can and do use today. Even when applying the speed threshold of 25 Mbps that some parties have insisted is the only relevant broadband speed, the transaction has no material impact on competition: even at this high threshold, the combined company’s broadband share would increase by only one percent. Cohen also again rebuffed claims that an even larger Comcast would possess an unfair portion of the national ad market, would use their scale in anti-competitive leverage against competitors, has used interconnection as a way to exert additional tolls from content companies, and could potentially harm diversity in programming selection.In short the deal is awesome, absolutely every single critic of the deal is in total and indisputable error, and not a single concern about the deal holds water. If you doubt it, Comcast has an army of paid analysts and think tankers prepared to bury you in misleading pie charts and cherry-picked statistics. Any questions? Cohen also again rebuffed claims that an even larger Comcast would possess an unfair portion of the national ad market, would use their scale in anti-competitive leverage against competitors, has used interconnection as a way to exert additional tolls from content companies, and could potentially harm diversity in programming selection.In short the deal is awesome, absolutely every single critic of the deal is in total and indisputable error, and not a single concern about the deal holds water. If you doubt it, Comcast has an army of paid analysts and think tankers prepared to bury you in misleading pie charts and cherry-picked statistics. Any questions?







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TechyDad

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join:2001-07-13

USA 4 recommendations TechyDad Premium Member Competition? So David Cohen is seriously pointing to DSL and Wireless as their competition? DSL is an old technology that the telecoms are dumping as quickly as they can. Wireless is expensive and capped at much lower levels than wired access. (Last I heard, Comcast's cap is around 300 - 400GB. My Verizon Wireless plan comes with a 10GB cap. I could pay for more, but it's expensive enough as it is.)



Next, they'll trot out the old "competition from Google Fiber will keep us honest" line. (Because competition in a small handful of cities will really impact their services in other cities.



This is some 100% weapons-grade bull he's spouting.