Netflix Petitions FCC to Block Comcast Time Warner Cable Merger

Photo: Josh Valcarcel/WIRED

Netflix has been one of the most vocal proponents of net neutrality, and now, the video streaming company is taking its fight straight to the top.

On Tuesday, the company filed a Petition to Deny document to the FCC, asking the government body to block the merger between Comcast and Time Warner Cable, two of the country’s largest internet service providers. It’s the first official appeal of its kind by Netflix, and yet, the lengthy 256-page petition echoes sentiments that Netflix CEO Reed Hastings has been extremely outspoken about since news of a potential merger first broke. It states that such a merger “would set up an ecosystem that calls into question what we to date have taken for granted: that a consumer who pays for connectivity to the Internet will be able to get the content she requests.”

Netflix’s fear, shared by much of the internet community, is that if the two companies were to merge they would have unprecedented power to charge companies like Netflix more for faster service. As Hastings recently told WIRED for a story on this very topic, Netflix has already signed deals with Comcast, Verizon, and AT&T, to ensure better service. And just this month, Netflix signed a similar deal with Time Warner Cable.

Hastings noted that it was only major ISPs charging these so-called interconnection fees, and not their smaller competitors. “Why would more profitable, larger companies charge for connections and capacity that smaller companies provide for free? Because they can,” Hastings wrote. “A combined company that controls over half of US residential Internet connections would have even greater incentive to wield this power.”

For large online video distributors like Netflix, such fees are troublesome, but ultimately, manageable. The greater concern, Hastings told WIRED, is that the proliferation of these fees will completely alienate smaller, leaner start-ups. “The next Netflix won’t stand a chance if the largest US Internet service providers are allowed to merge or demand extra fees from content companies trying to reach their subscribers,” Hastings wrote.

Netflix is far from alone in this fight. On Monday, DISH Network filed its own Petition to Deny to the FCC, citing many of the same concerns as Netflix. “As companies such as DISH innovate and invest to meet the growing consumer appetite for broadband-reliant video products and services, this chokehold over the broadband pipe would stifle future video competition and innovation,” the petition reads, “all to the detriment of consumers.”