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U.S. Preparing To Block AOL / Time-Warner Deal
Tuzanor writes: "Yahoo! is reporting that government officials are preparing to block the AOL-Time Warner deal if an agreement over Internet access isn't made in 2 weeks." I'd feel a lot better about this merger if local cable (like Time-Warner has such a big hand in) itself faced tougher competition than it does right now.
Why are you such an annoying whiner? If the CDs are starting to pile up, why not throw them away, like most of us do? What are you keeping them for? An why would you be "incensed" at receiving CDs instead of disks? Do you have a right to free disks?
I hope this sets the story straight on the extremely jingoistic article posted around a month ago :- EU Objects To AOL-Time Warner Merger. I never saw a "FCC and FTC put AOL-Time Warner merger under increased scrutiny" story posted on the front page, I think it's fair to say the only reason for posting the said story was to provoke the typical US v. Euro tribal war..
The EU have now approved the merger now TimeWarner called off the deal with EMI. Since the case is still under review by the FTC, I think it's fair to say the EU had good grounds to also investigate this deal, it's a shame people couldn't look past their nose and realise this.
Here's the Washington Post article.
The notion of a complete range of content belonging to one company is something that I recall being discussed over six years ago. People worried that a sole company could manage to control, essentially, all points of an average person's day on the web. Well, it's completely plausible now.
Picture, if you will. A user starts on AOL, and, without ever leaving the AOL revenue stream (Ad banners and affiliates) they get news from a dozen diffrent sources. Entertainment and TV/Movie info, running web searches, buying products, etc. And if they really wanted to, AOL could make life really interesting by mandating that no AOL-owned website may link to a non-AOL-owned website. Think it could never happen? Don't kid yourself, folks, it's easier than you may think.
... Andover.Net received permission to acquire open source oriented slashdot.org for an undisclosed sum in stock and cash despite Andover.Net's already substantial web site holdings. No FTC concessions required.
... VA Linux received permission to acquire the combined Andover.Net/slashdot conglomerate, adding these web sites to its linux.com and sourceforge holdings to create the dominant open source web company. Note that all these companies are for-profit, investor owned entities. No FTC investigation or concessions required.
... Red Hat acquires Cygnus Solutions, creating the dominant open source software company and establishing ownership over the development team for the critical GCC development toolchain. No investigation or concessions required.
I think it's odd that we see all these open-sourcers jumping all over corporate mergers when their own small section of the software world is dominated by a handful of players, especially Red Hat and VA. Best to first take the log out of your own eyes, boys.
Surely you herd how IBM Apple and Microsoft were about to merge ?
:)
Apparently the feds are going to block this move not because of antirust isues but becauase the resulting desktop system wold inherit the dominace of Windows but incorporate the faliurs of OS/2 and MacOS with the varius Windows problems.
The other problem is that the AOL/WB deal wold see Neo making "me too" posts and Trinity asking "How dose RTFM work ?"
to say nothing of the horor Bugs Bunney wold become
--= Isn't it surprising how badly I spell ?
$30/per and 25% of ad revenues doesn't sound too outrageous to me, given the heavy capital costs of building/upgrading the cable plant. Given MediaOne charges me $40/mo for cable modem service, that leaves $10/mo plus 75% of ad revenues to play with, which, given how cheap telephone modem based service is getting (and T3/dialup/etc charges drop out), seems pretty reasonable. Or, if T3 charges still apply, it's *still* a good deal. (Remember kids, the customer doesn't have to dedicate a $20/mo telephone line to Internet service anymore.)
Not good enough for you? Get your local governments to stop granting legal monopolies in exchange for taxes... er, "franchise fees", and let competing cable companies set up shop with their own plant. Maybe someone will have the brains to do full-blown fiber-to-the-home. "Why yes, I *would* like a 100Mbps pipe to the Internet..."
Until the federal government can pass even a single independent audit (ha!), it should take its sticky dirty fingers off the industry and leave us alone. Let the market decide on whether AOL/Time Warner is good for consumers. And yes while Microsoft sucks in so many ways, the split was ill-advised. Fortunately it now appears that Microsoft will win on appeal anyway
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well the federal government is the largest monopoly in the country. When will that monopoly be broken up hmm????
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So do you want anybody who wants to start a cable company to be able to dig a trench across your front yard to bury their cable a week after someone else did the same thing a week after someone else did the same thing, etc., or do you want no companies able to do so in order to offer you cable service?
I see even classic Slashdot is now pretty much unusable on dial up anymore.
More like worried that with a single company (which) would own every entertainment medium on the planet - movies, music, radio, web you'd be unable to get anything but that if that was what they wanted to give you.
I see even classic Slashdot is now pretty much unusable on dial up anymore.
How about because they get to dig up my front yard to run them whether I like it or not, but nobody else gets to run any?
I see even classic Slashdot is now pretty much unusable on dial up anymore.
Better yet, wait for the merger and just shove 'em into any Time-warner Cable van you see.
I see even classic Slashdot is now pretty much unusable on dial up anymore.
I don't want an all-fiber network. I want the phone system I have now-copper wire with a big ol' bunch of batteries that'll still work (at least around town and to 911) when the next hurricane takes out Carolina Power & Light and Time-Warner Cable. I can manage with rabbit ears and a generator for the duration, but tin cans and string stretched between me and the police or fire dept. just ain't gonna cut it.
I see even classic Slashdot is now pretty much unusable on dial up anymore.
Time-Warner has already paid local government their bribe (franchise fee, which they turn around and charge to the customers) which lets them be the only ones who can legally do that.
I see even classic Slashdot is now pretty much unusable on dial up anymore.
Sieze power.
It certainly is necessary and practical. The cable infrastructure which carries information to the people is every bit as important as the road, sewer, water distribution, and garbage collection services which are already run by local governments. These functions are often contracted to private entities, but the fact remains that they are operated by the people and in the people's interest.
Regarding cable television, I agree that the technology means that your decision has to be shared with other people. The solution is to abandon the dying broadcast technologies and run very high bandwidth fiber end to end. Technology will make this possible soon. At any rate, the less television you watch the better. :)
Your anti-socialism mechanism is producing false positives.
In such a system, open access would be the norm. Service providers would have equal access to the "other end" of the cables running into every home, and the citizen who was served by that cable would make the decision to hook it up to one or the other.
Hopefully in such a system, we wouldn't have pointlessly diverse content delivery systems (coax, twisted pair, circuit switched, packet switched, etc.), but instead be blessed with an all-fiber network that runs right into the point of delivery.
Doesn't anyone else think that the people should empower themselves this way?
And how many millions of citizens go through VA, Red Hat, or (heaven forbid) Slashdot for information about civil rights violations in the Sudan or (at least supposedly) intelligent reporting on political candidates? And can you tell me exactly what percentage of both content and delivery methods for that content are controlled by VA or Red Hat? There's a really big difference between a couple of relatively small potatoes software vendors (no flames please) and a behemoth news/entertainment/distribution conglomerate.
Because AT&T don't control content PRODUCTION. That's the real problem here. Personally, if this were simply a matter of two large delivery systems companies merging, I wouldn't care at all (and neither would the FTC in all likelihood). However, since AOL/Time-Warner will combine delivery (AOL's networks and user base, Time-Warner's cable networks and user base) with content (Time-Warner's incredibly large media and content holdings, which include almost every form of content: books, magazines, movies, television, news casting, music, and possibly even shamanism channeling) the whole thing becomes a lock-down on media in this country.
I know what you're getting at here but the problems with having more than one utility provide cabling and service to an area make this impractical.
I think it was supposed to be a joke.
I expect that it was moderated as a troll because there's no moderation option for "One-line comment pounded out as fast as possible in order to be the first post."
Although I'd have probably used "Overrated".
Charles Miller
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The more I learn about the Internet, the more amazed I am that it works at all.
Saying "Anyone can start their own Microsoft" is just like saying "Any US citizen can become president." In theory it's true, but in practice, it's laughable.
/more/ influence over our daily lives, and certainly have a huge influence over who sits in government.
In one hundred years time, people will look back on the 20th/21st century obsession with letting corporations do whatever the hell they want in the same way as we now look back on the "Divine Right of Kings".
They'll wonder why the hell people who are so willing to put immense restrictions (e.g. the US Constitution) on an elected government would be so religiously opposed to putting restrictions on un-elected businesses, who often have
Charles Miller
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The more I learn about the Internet, the more amazed I am that it works at all.
The US is a free enough country that anyone can start their own AOL, Microsoft, Time/Warner or whatever. These compaines are not monopolies, they have lots of competition. If you let the Government push around the companies you don't like, soon they'll start pushing around the companies you do like.
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enterfornone - logging in for a change
Folks,
The reason why the FTC may block the America Online/Time-Warner is more than just cable modem access.
The big issue here is the fact that between the resources of AOL and Time-Warner, they would create the world's most powerful corporation in terms of control of mass media.
If you look at the combined assets of AOL and Time-Warner, the result is ownership of a very sizeable fraction of the means to create media content AND distribute it. AOL is the world's largest Internet Service Provider (no contest), especially with their purchases of CompuServe, Netscape, ICQ, WinAmp, MapQuest and a few other Internet companies. Time-Warner has a massively powerful presence in movie and television program production, most of the influential cable TV channels (CNN Networks, HBO Networks, Turner Broadcasting), their own TV network, ownership of many cable systems in the USA, a book division, a major periodicals division, and a major producer of popular music.
Is it small wonder why if AOL and Time-Warner merged it would have made the company created by the fictional Elliot Carver from the James Bond movie TOMORROW NEVER DIES a very distinct a frightening reality? AOL Time Warner could have wielded the power to have a major say in what we see in the movie theatres and TV, what books and periodicals we read, what web sites we can visit and what music we can hear. Talk about potential abuse of First Amendment rights! (shudder)
Raymond in Mountain View, CA
I don't care.
:-) And I get my fun from the Web and from MP3s.
The power of the press has always belonged to those who owned one.
AOL/TW are going to be in every damn living room and theatre and TV set.
Except mine, I guess. I don't own one!
Its not as if we didn't have a choice NOT to go there. We just have to insure that they can't choke off everywhere else to go to (Sort of like the RIAA & MPAA and other neo-Ludddites.)
MSBPodcast.com The opinions expressed here are my own. If you don't like 'em... Think up your own stuff.
Oh, I agree that cable reguation is all f*ed up, and that things like the telcomm act of 96 have made things worse, not better.
Even so, I have doubts that TW has made their 13% profit back on the cable wiring side of their business. Instead, they have built a system where the real profits come from the content side, and they've used that content to subsidize the actual infrstructure costs. AT+T bleeds money off on their cable operations.
As far as competition goes, the system is already sorta "open" in the sense that the telephone companies have full rights to deliver television and data services to you. They also have the capital to do so. But, yet how many people in the US can get TV from the local Bell? Almost no one -- primarily because the Bells know that they'd never make their money back from infrastructure investment.
So, yeah, cable sucks because it's *expensive* to run coax to everyone's house when only 50% of the people will subscribe. (Cable Internet services are really just an incentive to get more people onto the TV system.) No amount of regulation is really going to change that.
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Business. Numbers. Money. People. Computer World.
A monopoly francise made perfect sense back in the 1980s when the cable system was being built out. Running wire to every home is an expensive proposition, and even then, adoption rates were far less than the companies expected. It took most companies years and years to make back their initial investment, usually not before getting bought out by someone huge like AT+T or TimeWarner who could carry the humongous debt load safely.
Keep in mind, cable TV is not exactly an essential service. Maybe a high speed Internet infrastructure will be in the future, but I don't think you can really make that argument right now.
Things like DSL or electric utiltity competition aren't a real solution either -- they primarily shift the edge costs of billing and customer service to other companies and don't address the real infrastructure costs. DSL is getting a real free ride because the copper networks were built out at great expense years ago, and it's only the fact that they've already been paid for many times over that DSL can get away with it's pricing system. (The wiring in my building and the telephone poles outside carrying my DSL was put in the 1920s, for example.)
The only real solution to the "last mile monopoly" problem is wireless. One big reason people the government is trying to auction of spectrum blocks is to let this problem resolve itself without having to regulate big contributers like TW or the Bells.
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Business. Numbers. Money. People. Computer World.
OK, Mr. Clever. If you'd slowed down for three seconds, you might have had the revelatory thought that a combined AOL-Time Warner merger would not only control entertainment, but also more important forms of information such as news and Internet access. Granted, it's difficult to censor the Internet, but it's unnecessary to truly censor it in order to control what people see. People are lazy, and if it's easy to read what AOL puts in front of you and more work to go read The Nation, people will choose the easy alternative. The result of media conglomeration is a decrease in the number and force of conflicting views. Go read Chomsky or Project Censored to find out about these phenomena from reputable, non-conspiracy-theorist sources. If you're not worried about stifled voices, go check out the TV news, and compare it with the New York Times. Now pretend Hard Copy is all you can get, without going to a lot of trouble. Worried now?
Switch the . and the @ to email me.
No monopoly, is good monopoly!
This sounds like high-order BS to me, or another lame 'net legend like the email tax.
Pope
Freedom is Slavery! Ignorance is Strength! Monopolies offer Choice!
It doesn't mean much now, it's built for the future.
Agreed. I dpn't mind subsidizing CSPAN, but why must I pay for MTV and all that other dreck...
Of course, I have DirecTV, which gives me more channels and orders of magnitude better reception for about 2/3 the price.
Rick
You are in a maze of twisty little passages, all alike.
in response to the sig (and mr. wright)
:)
2000 version of quote
if at first you don't succeed, keep the evidence as prior art
Are you this guy?
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If this strict interpetation of fidicuary responsiblity was correct, then Cisco management should be in prison for abiding by open IETF protocols instead of embracing and extending them into a proprietary control of the Internet (which was easily in their grasp to do over the last decade).
Cisco didn't go that route, for some linear combination of realizing growing the pie bigger was better than owning the whole pie, and the avoidance of inevitable anti-trust. Such nuanced decisions are part and parcel of managing a corporation -- as would AOL Time Warner supporting open access. In neither case would a "fidicuary responsibility" lawsuit arise.
Hey people....
We have a tendency to criticize quickly and then forget to complement. I think most of us agree that unless competition is protected, the merger should not go through.
I know we squabble about the issues surrounding the periphery, but lets please thank those deserving the credit for doing their job correctly: preserving justice and freedom.
So they're a big corporation
The only gripe I have is with cable itself
I like the idea of a fibre line with 2 small power lines attached to it.
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Life is a race condition: your success or failure depends on whether you get the work done on time.
What I always hated was the fact that they needed to switch to CDs in the first place. Getting a friend set up with email, graphical web browsing, chat, etc off of a floppy was really nice.
These days, you're right - everyone has coasters. Now, if they shipped their software on ZIP disks...
I mean, these CEOs are "supposed" to think when they're buying a company or merging with another one, right? They're supposed to plan everything! Why didn't thet plan THAT! Why don't they go to the courts first and ask : can we do it? That would save them a lot of time, and for their best interrests, a lot of money. Even tough AOL is a very arrogant company, didn't the CEO even think a minute : "Hey, are we be controling too much information for the governement's taste? Maybe we should ask first before spending millions of hard *cough-cough* earned money!?!"
Forget to say also in my last post, that the governement over here ordered Videotron, the largest cable provider, to give away 15% or 20% for free of their network, so that other ISP using cable modem could exist. Even tough Videotron is still the largest high speed provider in Quebec, small companies offering similar deals are starting to emerge and are showing profit right now, using the free network.
Other than cable, both companies pretty much have very dominating (but not monopolistic) stakes in their industries. I wonder where these companies plan to take this....
-Moondog
First Microsoft and now this. I'm actually getting warm fuzzies from the government!
Isn't it quite obvious that this sad and lonely guy is suffering from post-traumatic stress from when his ex-girlfriend dumped him, taking his TV with her. Now he thinks he has a life, something meaningful to do everyday. I really pity such abnormal behaviour, we all should do. However, I'm scared too. It's not hard to imagine such freaks at a kindergarten spraying bullets at all the small innocent kids.
- Steeltoe
Uuuuhu, even my brother don't own a television set, so there ;-)
http://www.debunkingskeptics.com/
Scared? About this crap? "movies, music, radio, web" - Is that all there is to your life? When was the last time you powered down what Douglas Coupland referred to as "the entertainment totem" and went outside for some fresh air? Visit a LIBRARY? Take a walk in the park? Go to a MUSEUM? Ride a bicycle? Call a friend? Do some volunteer work? Attend a student recital at the music school of the nearest university? You said "movies" - ever watch a film-school student's class project? Way more interesting than anything TW/AOL could ever dish out.
This reminds me about the part of the first Wayne's World movie where the arcade owner talks about his customers hitting the bar to get another pellet.
Time-Warner and AOL serve "entertainment" (your word, not mine) pellets to the willing rats.
If you are reading Slashdot, you just might be lucky enough to have the mental horsepower to rise above the mainstream schlock TW/AOL push down the pipe at you.
What, are you worried you might not get your Urkel re-runs? The new hit song by the next chest-implanted 16-year old pop star? Is that what you want?
Put down the remote or the mouse or whatever, and think about what's really important. Is all this hand-wringing over this deal really worth it? Are the forms of passive so-called "entertainment" that TW/AOL serve the most important things in your life? Maybe that junk is entertaining to you...
As if the BBC, the Christian Science Monitor, and all affiliates of the Corporation For Public Broadcasting would suddenly disappear into thin air the instant the merger was finalized. Right.
People are lazy, and if it's easy to read what AOL puts in front of you and more work to go read The Nation, people will choose the easy alternative.
This means the people are making a voluntary choice. They are choosing to be lazy. They have to accept the consequences of that choice. TW/AOL is not the one making a choice. People have the individual responsibility to seek out objective sources of information. I hardly think TW/AOL (or the government, for that matter) can or should be entrusted, expected, nor legislated into doing that. If you look to TW/AOL to spoon feed you your news and other information, then you deserve what you get.
Big media is not your mommy, despite what all the new-age, new-media luminaries from McLuhan onward would like you to believe. Big media will not take care of you. Big media will not think for you. Big media will give you their version of events, their morality, their biases. The people (however lazy) need to use their own moral compass to guide themselves through the muck. The big media outlets (TW/AOL especially) have no reponsibility to take care of you and to do your thinking for you. You have to do that yourself.
Ha! As if the crap mass-media consumer news outlets are going to get any worse as a result of this merger? Could they be any more intellectually bankrupt as a result of the TW/AOL merger than they already are?
Be lazy - pay the price.
One corporation had media (Time Warner-AOL), one had energy (Chevron-Texaco), one had computers (Microsoft),etc., etc. And that is just from watching CNN this week.
The fact that MGM is remaking this movie for next Summer's release may just be a cry of help from Hollywood (sorry can't stop snickering).
Anyway check it out ROLLERBALL
Reality is just a clever Hack, and the Planck constant is the refresh rate.
Free music from Jack Merlot.
When has choice ever been pointless?
Monopoly cable grants are the root of the problem. I get rapped by my ATT because they are the only people my local government has alowed to run cable. I'm not convinced that this rape was ever needed, and I'll never be convinced that it should last forever. I'll feel far more empowered if the public right of way is opened up rather than clamped down by my city hall.
Cable is not like electricity, where centrilization and standards had demonstrable social savings and monopolies made sense. Nor is it like the phone network where you need an individual line to each house. The more information networks you have the better off you are. Open it up and let the greedheads fight for clients.
Regulation should be along the lines of free access. No, not spam. People should be alowed to serve in a pull based way, it's the free speech of the future. Access should also be provided to the poor, as this will be the 911 of the future as well, but that is another matter to be considered if anyone can prove that it would be cheaper to abandon the current voice phone network than to expand and maintain it.
The linked article is rather scanty, here's another article that explains exactly what is holding up FTC approval and how it can be resolved.
;T says Time Warner negotiated deal not likely
AT&
Second Law of Blissful Ignorance
After all, if you don't like your cable company, you can move!
(For the sarcasm/humor impaired, don't take the above text seriously.)
I've often wondered exactly what AOL and Time Warner hope to gain from merging. Their early press releases on the issue stated that they wanted to do it so Time Warner could use AOL's 'net infrastructure to distribute media via the Internet... but now it raises interesting questions over cable Internet access. Doesn't Time Warner own a few cable companies here and there? I live in an area where cable Internet access is unavailable because the local cable monopoly, AT&T Cable, hasn't decided to roll out Internet service yet. Could Time Warner cable (whatever their cable divixion is) users be forced to get cable service only through America Online?
Blue Neon - a wonderfully insane online comic
This sort of thing (both the Onion article and your reference to it) are the best proof I've seen that television seriously undermines public discourse. Someone dares to question the importance that is placed on passive diversions like television and movies, and you start mocking him in a manner that is only a step or two above namecalling. I mean, why didn't you just accuse him of being a "nerd" or a "brain" or somesuch?
In essence, you're doing volunteer work for various large media corporations.
Netscape-AOL-Lycos-TimeWarner ??????? Where do you get Lycos from? Lycos is in no way involved inthe whole AOL-Time Warner merger/buy. In fact Lycos is merging with Terra networks, the largest ISP in Spain (majority owned by Telefonica S.A.).
Don't they have freedom of speech too?
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Peace,
Lord Omlette
ICQ# 77863057
[o]_O
They built the cable lines, why should they have to share them?
Al Gore and his DARPA friends built the Internet backbone (no really); why should they have to share it?
Will I retire or break 10K?
Use DLS[sic] instead of cable modem
With DSL you have to live within about 3.5 km of the telco's switch. And most towns don't have their switches placed in such a way to cover the whole town.
Will I retire or break 10K?
Its funny to read the andover page that says "Leading the linux revolution" and yet netcraft says they run solaris. Practice what you preach.
Only the State obtains its revenue by coercion. - Murray Rothbard
What's being overlooked here is that the executives of these companies have a fiduciary responsibility to their shareholders to maximize share value and profit. They personally may like to see open access, but as executives they are pretty much required not to pass up an opportunity to control, in this case, practically the whole damned internet.
No, its "Army of Lamers" ;)
BTW, is anybody else incensed that AOL started using CD's a couple years back? I can't format the disks and use them any more, so end up getting a free coaster about every week or so. They're starting to pile up!
I have an idea... Insteading creating further waste by throwing them away, lets collect as many of those frickin' CDs as we can. Stuff them into 5 gallon garbage bags, and load as many U-Hauls as possible. Then drive down to Dulles, VA and unload them onto the steps of AOL headquarters. Maybe they'd get the message.
Well, dear Coward, if you were only slightly more knowledgeable about economy, capitalism, American/European differences, etc..., you would certainly know that the Wall Street Journal is a very poor newspaper made for economically clueless people who can only understand a vulgarized and populist vision of economy. Or for people who only seek numeric facts before they buy or sell stocks.
As for Finland, let me say that its economic performances are simply excellent, and its system is overall very efficient on most "societal" issues. Its recovery from the great recession due to the collapse of USSR (which was its main export partner) is spectacular. Its GDP/inhabitant is reasonably high, but actually understates the prosperity of the average Finn guy, since the level of inequalities is much lower than in that other country which thinks of itself as the ultimate universal model (do I need to name it?). In other words, the vast majority of the wealth is not in the hand of a very few, so the median income is not ridiculously low as compared to the average income. Do I also have to mention that even the poorest Finn men have access to an excellent education, an excellent health coverage, and a very reliable retirement system?
PS: I'm not Finn, I'm French.
Actually the European comission is very efficient on monopoly-related issues and is enforcing most European countries to endorse more competition-friendly practices (in other words, to forget national pride when it comes to economy). And these days, the most economically nationalist country among the rich ones is not in Europe. It's the US.
Now, I know it's very fashionable these days to describe the EU institutions as a bunch of inefficient technocrats. In some cases, this is very true, especially when it comes to agriculture and most food-related issues. Yet, on many economic and institutional issues, these oh-so-lame bureaucrats are simply bringing a lot of rational changes that the average citizen in your (very nice) country as well as in mine will benefit from.
Here is a link for an Open Letter written by NorthNet, here is the local news article.
"Open code, in other words, can be a check on state power." -Lawrence Lessig
deals with the local ISPs for cable access. In my hometown the local ISP, Northnet has written letters of protest to the FCC and FTC about the deal offered them. AOL wants $30 per ISP customer, plus 25% of the ISP's advertising revenue. Seems a deal like that would put local ISPs out of business.
Seems awful stupid to me to offer such an outrageous deal to ISPs in light of the proposed merger. Who do they think they are, Micro$oft?
They should have offered leased lines at reasonable prices, not a per customer charge, and perhaps 1% to 2% of generated ad revenue. AOL/TimeWarner had better watch their step, or they may become the next target of the DOJ!
"Open code, in other words, can be a check on state power." -Lawrence Lessig
I would feel a lot better about this merger if Time-Warner wasn't one of the top 5 contributors to the Gore\Liebierman campaign (iirc).
Hopefully I didn't put any [] around my words.
The US is a free enough country that anyone can start their own AOL, Microsoft, Time/Warner or whatever.
True, but there's the (significant) chance that you either won't have enough of a customer base as compared to the Big Corporations to stay in business, or that you will just be bought out by one of said Corporations. That is one of the big reason why large corporate monopolies are bad -- they have a tendency to squash potential competition.
If you let the Government push around the companies you don't like, soon they'll start pushing around the companies you do like.
Or, as in more and more recent cases, the company will push the government around. For example, the MPAA et al buying the DMCA.
=================================
I pledge allegiance to the flag...
of the Corporate States of America...
In the US, this should be the government. Knowledge of technology should be an important determining factor to the voters. Does your congressman respond to email? Clue #1. How do they respond to technology questions or issues involving technology? Clue #2.
Ask the right questions in ways that speak to the largest group in the response and choose. Ultimately, your concerns will be resolved in D.C., as will the influence of industry be directed!
effer
-hmm, you call this beer, huh?-
You and your giant brain may be above the pellets that the entertainment industry dishes out. Good for you. But the other 99% of the US is getting their information -- all of it -- from a decreasing number of sources.
If this doesn't bother you, then I envy your undersea hideaway, or wherever it is that you live.
Maybe I am just paranoid, but if AOL/TimeWarner/whoever else decided to merge with Disney...and then with Microsoft, there would be enough power and money to take over the world.....Of course...I always sorta thought that was what Bill Gates had in mind...
The anti-salmon
If i told you, I'd have to kill you. There is a prize involved...i don't want anyone stealing my idea to shingle an entire roof with aol cds...so i'm not telling anyone.
My friend and I also worked out a design to build a scooter completely from aol cds....and i mean completely. Sort of scary idea...but if anyone has any aol cds to get rid of, I am in great need of them. Email me please. peter@iceball.net
The anti-salmon
ship em' to me! there is a contest for creative aol cd usage..and i have a good idea...I only need about 4 or 5 thousand more.
The anti-salmon
What's boning them now is Case's flip-flop on open access. Before negotiations for the merger began he was a vocal advocate for legislation forcing network owners to open their networks to competing ISP without their own lines.
Now he's going to be a high muckety-muck with billions in stock and stock options at one of the world's largest corporations, and *poof*! Suddenly, those pro-competitive open networks he used to champion are tantamount to communism. Regulators tend to notice things like this.
Things that make you go "Hmmmmm."
-- He's fantastic, made of plastic....
That doesn't help us apartment dwellers. My appt building finally let us install dishes this year, at $300 deposit. And that's only if your appartment's balcony is on the south side.
With DSL, I have to sign a contract and pay installation. With cable, I can move to another apartment, plug in the cable modem into the cable outlet and go.
Cable is far from perfect. But for us people who are mobile and don't like to throw away money on contracts and installation, it's a much better option. I will move to DSL when I have my own home. But by that time, I'm sure something better will be along.
The idea that a single company would own every entertainment medium on the planet - movies, music, radio, web - doesn't scare you enough?
- I don't care if they globalize against free speech. All my best free thoughts are done in my head.
I see the same thing happening with the Time Warner-AOL deal. Eventually they will relent and agree to open their networks, but when it comes time for them to actually lease a line to a competing ISP, I wager they will balk. They will argue there are technical problems, or claim the other ISP is being unreasonable, or just sell the line for an outrageous price that would make it impossible to make a profit. Whatever the case, don't count on open access very soon, it just isn't in AOL or Time Warner's best interest.
.sigless
Enigma
Enigma
Enigma
alright, i'll bite...
what the devil could you possibly use 4000-5000 aol cd's for?
eudas
Blessed is he who expects the worst, for he shall not be disappointed.
Unnamed sources said negotiators for both sides have been unable to reach a deal over how the merged company would ensure that rival Internet service providers would have access to its high-speed cable network.
They're not likely to actually stop it. This is just a standard negotiationg tactic. Whenever negotiations break down, a few "strategic leaks" combined with a threat of actual gov't action (perish the thought) are pretty much standard procedure.
1Alpha7
Live to be Moderated
Are you moderators so used to the first post being an "Fp!"-style troll that you just mod it down without checking now? :)
Their needs to be some group that is centered around blocking mega murgers that are going to hurt consumers. Hint Hint someone.
This doesn't mean my cable modem acess will be routed through AOL does it? That would REALLY suck... I know they'd find a way to create busy signals =]
cuban
I was against it from the start.... Netscape-AOL-Lycos-Time-Warner would be too powerful. Specifically, AOL would have too much free advertising, and there would be a sudden influx of AOLamers on the internet. Ugh. My job would get harder overnight.
BTW, is anybody else incensed that AOL started using CD's a couple years back? I can't format the disks and use them any more, so end up getting a free coaster about every week or so. They're starting to pile up!
If you believe everything you read, you'd better not read. - Japanese proverb
I rarely applaud the government's actions, but this is definetly an honorable one. The merger of TimeWarner with AOL would be akin to joining hydriodic acid with hand soap, or even the marriage of "crazy" and "stupid", as is evident in such people as Saddam Hussein and Jim Carrey. Want to take a two-hour peek into a future with AOLTimeWarner in it? Just rent "Dumb and Dumber", the situation will be similar.
"Ancillary does not mean you get to rule the world." --U.S. Circuit Judge Harry Edwards, speaking to the FCC's lawyer
The Federales are getting antsy about the possibility that the USA will be merged next into the Times-Warner-AOL colossus, and then they'll all be demoted to customer support with pimply-faced "1337 #4}{0r5" as their bosses.
A truly excellent pizza parlor is a delight unto the heavens. Treasure the sauce and the toppings!
There are so many other choices. Use a dish instead of cable. Use DLS instead of cable modem (I can't get either where I live). I am not sure that AOL/TW can corner anything.
Hell, M$ is offering DSL thru Radio Shack, and bi-directional satellite to follow...
"The world's largest Internet services provider's efforts to buy the cable and publishing giant Time Warner won European approval on Wednesday only after AOL offered to sever all structural links with German media group Bertelsmann AG (BTGGga.F). That concession eliminated the risk of dominance in the emerging market for online delivery of music over the Internet and software-based music players."
Being Dutch this leaves me slightly puzzled, do I have to believe now that the EU, this most bureaucratic, most inefficient, most undemocratic, and sometimes even corrupt supra-govermental institution did something right for a change?
This seems to be a matter where the EU was aware of the European situation (AOL having ties with Bertelsmann), aware of possible monopolies (AOL+TW+BM against the rest), and they were able to get a result.
The EU categorically forbidding the AOL/TW merger seems to be a bit rich.
BTW: http://www.annodomini.org.uk/aol-t ime -warner/
Screw the FCC and FTC. Neither of these mergers should be happening, but if one is, both should. To allow AT&T to become the next Internet monopolist unimpeded is an astonishing government policy.
It's a little like Microsoft buying IBM and nobody saying anything, but when Apple subsequently buys Motorola the powers that be going ape-shit.
--
You are not alone. This is not normal. None of this is normal.
Wired from a couple months ago had an article on the AOL/Time-Warner merger (get it here). It was rather long, but it was very informative, and definitely worth the read if you're not up-to-snuff on the issue. It looks as if these two companies have their leadership infrastructure well planned out. I doubt that there's any chance the merger will just _not happen_. Especially not over something trivial like a bit of a mixup concerning broadband (if such a problem even exists). If anything, the merger is a sure thing; unless of course, the government decides to get involved...or a meteor destroys the north american continent or something. Well, no doubt, the government _will_ get involved (why stop with just Microsoft?); but I'm sure AOL/Time-Warner will get their problems straightened out. It's a natural reaction to fear such an intimidating company, and people will be trying to poke holes in it whenever possible. One could write a book on it. However, the Wired article should suffice. -David "Ryouga" H. Cut the kids in half...
-Ryouga
AOL and Time/Warner uniting is undoubtedly a bad thing. It would effectively be a new Microsoft in a Multimedia world. Time/Warner and AOL would effectively own broadband cable network and cable TV access. This would be a bad thing. A very bad thing. Redundant, I know. I cannot fathom to think of how bad service would be if the merger would happen. Cable TV would lag with how bad service is.
I shouldn't speak ill of it, but AOL has a strangle hold on the Internet, and Time/Warner has a strangle hold on cable TV, not to mention all the multimedia that Time/Warner owns, like their Arcade and computer entertainment division. All that Microsoft would need to match is a cable service... but hey, wouldn't that create competition?
Cogito, ergo sum.