FreePress, which philosophically opposes competition policy, effectively is mocking antitrust law and authorities by cynically feigning to care about antitrust and competition in calling for an antitrust investigation of "TV Everywhere" efforts to enable authenticated paying video customers the additional convenience of accessing their paid-for content on any device at no extra cost.
- FreePress is misrepresenting its latest report -- "TV Competition Nowhere" -- as antitrust analysis when it is standard FreePress villain-ization of broadband and media businesses.
In their own words, FreePress is anti-competition, anti-property, and anti-business.
- FreePress' co-founder Robert McChesney recently said:
- "What we want to have in the U.S. and in every society is an Internet that is not private property, but a public utility. We want an Internet where you don't have to have a password and that you don't have to pay a penny to use."
- In an April 2009 letter to Congress FreePress Policy Director Ben Scott asked Congress to investigate if broadband profit was an "unfair business practice:"
- "We urge you to consider whether above-cost metered pricing for broadband constitutes an unfair business practice." (p. 3, 1st para)
- In October 2009, FreePress Research Director Derek Turner actually argued that government rate regulation and business practice bans would not negatively affect private broadband investment in: "Finding the Bottom Line: The truth about network neutrality & investment."
FreePress is making a grave mistake in cynically assuming that antitrust law enforcers are political, easily manipulated, and don't believe in over a century of real world experience -- that competition better serves consumers and society than monopolies or antitrust-regulation attempting to simulate the myriad of market decisions produced by competition.
- Unlike FreePress, antitrust enforcers believe in competition, competition policy, and property rights.
FreePress is barking up the wrong tree if they think they can politically manipulate antitrust enforcers into abusing their law enforcement authority to advance FreePress' radical political agenda, or duping them into ignoring the law, precedent, or the facts.
Antitrust authorities weren't born yesterday. They won't fall for FreePress' gross misrepresentation of broadband or video TV markets as monopolies at risk of no competition.
- They know many unanimous FCC annual reports have consistently shown the video marketplace is competitive and getting increasingly competitive.
- They know how bad online piracy of TV, movies and other copyrighted content is.
Simply, FreePress doesn't seek more video distribution competition, FreePress seeks less video competition via Government regulation of all broadband distribution as public utilities and via radical abrogation of copyrights.
-
FreePress is anti-competition and anti-property, the antithesis of real antitrust.
