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[Commentary] It’s March again, a time when most sports fans root for underdogs. Of course, a few people lean towards favorites, including a small and odd fan club assembling for AT&T’s proposed $39 billion acquisition of T-Mobile. What’s especially puzzling are the strange reasons that some cheerleaders and some casual observers cite in favor of this mega-merger – one that would increase concentration vastly in a market that already is highly concentrated – when most people see through the illusory claimed benefits.
Wireless users and wireless competitors alike are upset by the proposed acquisition, which would combine the second and fourth largest U.S. carriers, rocketing AT&T back into the top slot and giving it more than 40 percent of U.S. subscribers. That combination inevitably would lead to fewer choices and higher prices for consumers and businesses that use mobile voice and data services. It would affect not only current T-Mobile customers, but customers of other carriers as well, who would find themselves with fewer alternative providers. It would harm AT&T’s competitors too, most of whom already incur higher device costs and operating expenses directly attributable to AT&T’s exclusionary conduct.
[Wood is associate director of Media Access Project]
Public would lose out from AT&T, T-Mobile deal
[Commentary] The bottom line of AT&T's proposed $39 billion takeover of competitor wireless company T-Mobile is pretty simple. AT&T wins. Everyone else loses, particularly those who will lose their jobs as a result. Mergers are job killers, and this one will be no different.
AT&T, of course, won't tell you that. They will crow about “efficiencies” and helping to fulfill the Obama Administration's broadband goals and, not incidentally, about all the extra revenue per user that the new combined company will rake in over the next few years. These are the kinds of arguments that proponents of mergers usually make. This deal is different. This deal cannot withstand antitrust scrutiny. It is a classic horizontal merger that does nothing but combine companies in the same business.The Obama Administration has to step up to see the reality of the situation and enforce a strong antitrust policy. The Department of Justice should reject this deal out of hand.
[Sohn is the president and co-founder of Public Knowledge]
AT&T: 1, Consumers: 0
[Commentary] We think the AT&T|T-Mobile deal should not be approved, for several reasons.
One is customer service. As the ad implies, AT&T is not known for its good service. Paul Reynolds of Consumers Union reports that their surveys "found AT&T to be the clear worst wireless carrier in the country." AT&T is rolling out new technology, so its service will probably improve, but still this is a case of the acquiring company being the one with the most problems. Another reason is price. Wall Street sees the gobbling up of T-Mobile "as the elimination of a pesky low-priced rival," says Eric Savitz of Forbes. Customers need to have companies like that. Both of these reasons are part of a larger concern about market power. This transaction combines the No. 2 and No. 4 in the market, creating a new No. 1. That leaves Sprint Nextel at a weak No. 3. The obvious next step is the combination of Verizon and Sprint. At that point, the mobile-phone providers becomes a Pepsi-and-Coke market with two big choices.
AT&T purchase of T-Mobile should be rejected
Google and the New America Foundation unveiled a new set of tools that depict broadband availability and performance across the globe at an event in Washington.
Google chief Internet evangelist Vint Cerf took the stage to show off new visualization tools that he said would help researchers make sense of the mountain of data. Cerf said the goal is to understand broadband experiences across the U.S. and internationally without relying on advertised speeds. "There are lots of assertions about broadband rankings that are often not very quantitative," Cerf said. "We're interested in making those more crisp and understandable by getting solid data behind everything." The search giant teamed up with researchers in 2009 to create Measurement Lab (M-Lab), an open-source set of broadband measurement tools; since then the project has conducted more than half a billion tests and generated 300 terabytes of data. The data is collected from computers across the globe conducting tests using the M-Lab platform and downloaded to Google servers. Cerf emphasized that Google is simply hosting the data and has made it publicly available.
Please see New America Foundation press release:
http://newamerica.net/pressroom/2011/more_than_a_broadband_map_0
Google's Vint Cerf touts broadband measurement tools
The New York Times will try to make it more difficult to use Internet search engines to avoid paying for frequent visits to the newspaper's website. The Times will limit Web surfers arriving through major search engines to five free articles per day, spokeswoman Kristin Mason confirmed. That restriction was only supposed to apply to traffic sent by Google Inc.'s search engine, which processes about two out of every three online queries. Now, other search engines including Yahoo Inc. and Microsoft Corp.'s Bing will be limited to five free stories apiece as well. The Times' online fees take effect in the U.S. March 28. The Times didn't explain why it decided to expand the restrictions to other search engines.
The Times has also requested Twitter to disable FreeNYTimes, a Twitter feed started to take advantage of one of the holes in the paywall: While users are allowed only 20 pageviews a month before the wall kicks in, visits to the site via social media links are unlimited.
NY Times vs Workarounds NY Times Asks Twitter to Shut Down Paywall Dodgers (Forbes)
A paper from the London School of Economics that tries to do more than just challenge the UK's Digital Economy Act, passed last year. "Creative Destruction and Copyright Protection" argues that everything Big Content says about file sharing is wrong.
In fact, it suggests that file sharing is the future, and that revenue downturns can largely be explained by other forces. "The music industry is performing better than is being claimed and declining sales can be explained by other factors in addition to illegal filesharing," say Bart Cammaerts and Bingchun Meng of LSE's Department of Media Studies. "The negative framing of the debate about file-sharing and copyright protection threatens to stifle the very same creative industry the Act aims to stimulate."
Did file-sharing cause recording industry collapse? Economists say no
AT&T’s announcement this week that it was acquiring T-Mobile USA was touted by the companies as a move that would strengthen and expand the nation’s mobile broadband infrastructure. But industry experts are at odds on what kind of impact, if any, this union of telecom giants will have on local government customers.
Although AT&T was confident competitiveness among wireless carriers would remain after the merger, citing statistics that five or more providers are available in 18 of the top 20 U.S. markets, local government advocates remain somewhat skeptical, as just three major national cellular carriers -- Verizon Wireless, AT&T and the much smaller Sprint -- are still in the market. Gerard Lederer, an attorney with Miller and Van Eaton -- a law firm that represents clients in the areas of local government and telecommunications -- said he’s recommending that his government clients think about the budget implications the merger could have on the local level. “All of the issues that consumers face apply equally to local governments, [except that] the multiplier effect of a bad deal can be that much greater,” Lederer said.
AT&T and T-Mobile Merger Could Impact Local Government Revenue
Brands have long recognized the power of cause marketing to help them stand out from the crowd and generate consumer loyalty. They have often reached out to moms in social media to engage their support. What's new is that blogger-brand cause partnerships now go both ways: The women who are heavily involved in social media are increasingly recognizing that they themselves can use their influence to initiate change to help others.
Beyond The Swag: Bloggers Use Social Media To Do Good
According to Deloitte's fifth edition "State of the Media Democracy" survey, 71% of Americans still rate watching TV on any device among their favorite media activities.
In addition, 86% of Americans stated that TV advertising still has the most impact on their buying decisions. The survey indicates that the Internet, mobile and social media channels are enhancing the overall television viewer experience, driving people to watch first-run programs and live events during their initial broadcast. And, nearly three-quarters of American consumers are multitasking while watching TV. 42% are online, 29% are talking on cellphones or mobile devices, and 26% are sending instant messages or text messages. 61% of U.S. consumers now maintain a social networking site, where constant streams of updates and discussion forums have made delaying awareness of live TV outcomes a near impossibility.
TV Advertising Most Influential
In a move by the Nielsen Company that could spark a more drawn-out legal battle, the ratings company has accused rival comScore of infringing five patents it owns that relate to measuring and displaying online content.
In a lawsuit filed in a Virginia federal court, Nielsen names more than 30 different comScore products it believes are violating its patent rights. Nielsen sued several other ratings companies a few years ago, but has been quiet until now, as the Hollywood Reporter pointed out. Three of the five patents mentioned in this lawsuit are Nielsen’s own, and were granted in 2008 and 2009. Two other patents were granted in 2000 and 2002, and were originally owned by Jupiter Media Metrix, which used them to sue Nielsen. Nielsen settled that suit in 2002 by paying $15 million, and it acquired the two patents as part of the settlement. Nielsen is making a dangerous play by suing comScore. The most common strategy in responding to a patent attack is to sue back with one’s own patents, and that could mire both of these companies in expensive litigation if they don’t reach a quick settlement. Even if comScore doesn't have patents of its own to counter-sue with, it’s not terribly difficult to purchase patents for that purpose. Still, this is new territory for comScore; federal courts records indicate this is the first patent suit the company has faced.
Nielsen Sues comScore In The Battle Of The Audience-Measurement Firms