Five Reasons Why Critics of Comcast’s Time Warner Cable Deal Are Feeling Hopeful

[Commentary] Critics of Comcast’s proposed acquisition of Time Warner Cable sounding cautiously optimistic it’ll either be killed or heavily conditioned. Here’s why:

1. Many, Many Complaints: The Federal Communications Commission has already gotten 81,000 comments, mostly from consumers. And at least 19 parties have asked regulators to kill the acquisition, including Dish Networks, Netflix, Frontier Communications and Internet backbone provider Cogent Communications.
2. Conditions? What Conditions? Regulators are taking a closer look at industry complaints that Comcast hasn’t abided by conditions imposed on its acquisition of NBCUniversal three years ago.
3. National or Local? Some senior FCC officials always viewed the Comcast-TWC deal as more of a deal about Internet access. That’s why FCC Chairman Tom Wheeler’s recent speech about how the residential broadband market isn’t very competitive was seen as a bad thing for Comcast.
4. Some Call It Extortion: Comcast’s extraordinary attack on some competitors -- saying they have tried to extort the cable giant -- raised eyebrows. Comcast’s critics point to evidence that complaints about the deal are gaining traction and that Comcast is sweating.
5. Ties to Network Neutrality: The FCC is currently rewriting the net neutrality rules, and while it doesn’t have anything directly to do with the Comcast deal, political considerations are likely to tie the two together.