ACA: Smaller ISPS Lack Leverage to Be Anticompetitive Threat

Smaller cable operators don't have the incentive or ability to act anticompetitively toward either their customers or edge providers. That came in American Cable Association comments to the Federal Trade Commission as it tees up month-long hearings on protecting consumers and competition in a digital age. ACA said smaller operators provide vital connectivity, particularly in the rural areas the government is focused on bringing into that digital age as full participants. But what they don't provide is any sort of anticompetitive threat that needs government to step in, "nor have edge providers complained about smaller ISPs unreasonably leveraging them," ACA adds. "If leverage exists, it lies with upstream providers [edge providers] (just as it does in the video programming market)." ACA has long complained about programmers' power to bundle programming into must-make deals that wind up requiring smaller operators to pay for and carry channels they don't want, a cost ACA told the FTC is increasingly difficult to pass on to customers -- and therefore reduces the money available for other things, like broadband deployment.