Public Knowledge Provides Further Grounds for FCC to Block the Comcast/Time Warner Cable Merger

The record before the [Federal Communications Commission] is already clear: This merger is not in the public interest. If successful, Comcast, which is already the nation’s largest cable company and Internet Service Provider, would control around half of the broadband market nationwide. This would make it the nation's content gatekeeper, with the power to single-handedly decide what the nationwide media marketplace looks like. This would harm consumers by raising costs, making it more difficult to access independent programming and online content, and limiting the opportunities for new kinds of online services.

In this filing, Public Knowledge and the Open Technology Institute rebut a few of the most egregious of Comcast's claims. Additionally, we include technical analyses and consumer survey data which underscore the power dominant ISPs like Comcast have over consumers and the broadband marketplace, and that show that the harms dominant ISPs can inflict on their subscribers are real today, and would get worse if Comcast gets even bigger.