Throughout his tenure as a senator Al Franken has made media consolidation and network neutrality his signature platforms and he definitely isn’t happy with the Comcast and NBC deal, which passed through the FCC and DoJ yesterday .
During his speech, which was happening at the same time that the FCC announcement approving the deal was made, Senator Franken said among other things that the decision “will create essentially two Internets.” He also believes that we will see a direct move by the combined company to try and shut down Netflix.
When it comes to the Comcast merger, Franken was even more vocal. “As you probably know, I hate this merger,” he told the group. Not only will it raises prices on TV subscriptions, it will give the combined entity incredible power to stifle competition from online sources like Netflix.
“I’m hearing that Comcast is already preparing to pull NBC Universal’s programming from Netflix when it’s next up for review,” Franken said. The cable industry is worried about the threat from cheaper options like Netflix; “they aren’t stupid and they want to shut it down.”
via Ars Technica
Here is a video of his speech for those interested.
