Subcommittee Gets Earful on Video Competition

[SOURCE: Broadcasting&Cable, AUTHOR: John Eggerton]
Depending on whom you were listening to at a Senate Judiciary Hearing yesterday, the proposed divvying up of Adelphia cable systems between Comcast and Time Warner Cable is either a boon to the bankrupt company's 5 million subscribers, or another step toward cable's monopoly of video distribution. The hearing had two parts: the Adelphia-Time Warner-Comcast deal and the entry of telephone companies into the video delivery market. Congress is preparing to update the 1996 Telecommunications Act in light of market and technological changes, including media concentration and the rise of alternative providers like satellite, telcos, wireless and the Internet. Witness Mark Cooper of Consumer's Union argued that the clustering of the divvied-up systems would lead to greater market power for Comcast and Time Warner, including control over programming, which he said they already exerted to favor their affiliated networks.
http://www.broadcastingcable.com/article/CA6276032?display=Breaking+News&referral=SUPP
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* For links to testimony (eventually) see:
http://judiciary.senate.gov/hearing.cfm?id=1642