Antitrust

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE

February 13, 2014

Contact:  Scott Cleland 703-217-2407

The Comcast-Time Warner Cable Merger is Pro-competitive,

The Communications Marketplace Has Never Been More Competitive,

And American Consumers Have Never Had More Communications Choices

Mobile & Cloud Competition & Innovation are Dynamically Changing Communications 

WASHINGTON D.C. – The following quotes on the announcement of the Comcast-Time-Warner Cable merger may be attributed to Scott Cleland, Chairman of NetCompetition:

• “Not only is the Comcast-Time Warner Cable merger pro-competitive, via the improvement of services and innovation for millions of Americans and many thousands of businesses, this merger also is occurring in the most competitive communications marketplace with the most consumer choices ever. It should be approved”

Please read my latest Daily Caller op-ed: “How the Google-EC Competition Deal Harms Europe” – here.

• It is Part 31 of my Google Unaccountability research series.

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Google Unaccountability Series

Please read my latest Daily Caller op-ed: “The European Commission’s Google Antitrust Problems are not Going Away” – here.

• It is Part 30 of my Google Unaccountability research series.

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Google Unaccountability Series

Part 0: Google's Poor & Defiant Settlement Record [5-1-12]

Some wireless competitors and the DOJ/OSTP are urging the FCC to effectively change their spectrum aggregation rules to treat low-band spectrum-technology <1 GHz competitively different than high-band spectrum-technology >1 GHz.

If the FCC complies, it effectively would subdivide the current spectrum marketplace into two technology markets: <1GHz and >1GHz, for the first time in twenty years of spectrum auction history. It also would set the precedent for the FCC to arbitrarily subdivide the spectrum market further in future auctions based on the FCC’s latest technology-mix prognostications at that time.

Big picture, it would represent a regression back towards the 1980s pre-auction period when the FCC, not competitive market auctions, decided which company got what spectrum, and how certain spectrum was allocated.

For satire to work, one has to have something to work with. Well Google doesn’t disappoint!

Please don’t miss the grins and aha-s from this playful satire -- here.

Google represents its new default policy -- taking a user’s name and picture and putting it in their ads without permission or compensation -- as “Shared Endorsements.”  This deceptive and unfair business practice is more aptly named Google-YouAd, “Pirated Endorsements,” or “Swindled Endorsements,” because they are taken deceptively without permission or compensation.

To Google, people apparently are just another form of digital content that should be open and free to exploit without asking the owner for permission and without any expectation of payment from Google for the value that Google generates from the taken content.

We should not be surprised. Google is treating their users, not as humans with privacy and ownership rights, but as inanimate products, content, and “targets” of their advertising model. Notice that they are treating people’s unique identities just like they treat others valuable content that is trademarked, copyrighted, patented, private, confidential or secret. Simply they take it without permission or compensation until an authority that they fear compels them to cease and desist.

If you are interested in learning the linchpin issue to watch to discern whether the FCC’s competition policy will be modern or nostalgist directionally, don’t miss my Daily Caller Op-ed: “The Modern FCC Competition-Policy Linchpin” – here.

• It is Part 6 in the Modernization Consensus Research Series.

Modernization Consensus Series

Part 1: Implications of Google's Broadband Plans for Competition and Regulation - Part 1 Modernization Consensus Series [1-28-13]

Just like the wisdom that one cannot make a silk purse from a sow’s ear; one cannot make “modern” FCC policy from obsolete communications law.

Apparently that is not stopping Former FCC Chairman Reed Hundt and Greg Rosston from trying in their new white paper: “Articulating a Modern Approach to FCC Competition Policy.”   

Their paper contrives:  “three different competition policy approaches: the classicrole of regulating terms and conditions of sale, the modernrole of using various tools to create largely deregulated, multi-firm, competitive markets, and the laissez-faire approach of believing that unregulated markets, even if monopolized, will produce the best outcome.”

Google’s recent “Report: How Google Fights Piracy,” begs cross-examination, for the same reason courts and Congress employ the tool of cross examination and the process of adversarial hearings to get to the real truth. 

We all are familiar with the legal oath: “Do you solemnly swear that you will tell the truth, the whole truth and nothing but the truth so help you God?”

Please see my latest Daily Caller Op-ed – “Implications of EU Ruling Google Abused its Search Dominance” -- here.

Google Unaccountability Series

Part 0: Google's Poor & Defiant Settlement Record [5-1-12]