WSJ Reports AT&T May Be Eying a $40B DirecTV Acquisition

New submitter rcht148 (2872453) writes with this excerpt from The Verge:"If the idea of Comcast buying out Time Warner Cable to become the largest cable company in America wasn't enough to make you worry about media consolidation, news [Wednesday] from the Wall Street Journal just might. Reportedly, AT&T has approached DirecTV to begin 'possible acquisition' talks, a deal that the WSJ says could be worth over $40 billion. If it were to happen, it would give the combined company something on the order of 26 million TV subscribers, making it second only to the hypothetical Comcast/TWC combination of 30 million."

Comments

net neutrality

[arbiterxero]

All the more reason net neutrality matters. A LOT.

Hmmm, do I want the disney internet, or the work internet, or the Time-Warner internet, or the HBO internet...

It will become mindless channels instead of the broad communication tool it is now

Re:net neutrality

[Darinbob]

Well, it sort of has HughesNet, not sure if that's really part of DirecTV or not. It's only 1-2Mbps though, with somewhat low daily bandwidth caps. Great for web browsing at home, not really viable for streaming.

Pretty soon we'll all have exactly two choices

[NotDrWho]

Want internet? You can have either Comcast or AT&T. Choose one.

Re:Pretty soon we'll all have exactly two choices

[smooth wombat]

Is there no comparable funding in the US, and if not, what is the political obstacle?

Back in the late 90s and early 2000s, the U.S. government gave out billions of dollars to companies to lay fiber all over the country for the expected increase in internet usage. They were trying to give a boost to the thousands of ISPs we had at that time by taking over some of the cost of the upgrade.

Tens of thousands of miles of fiber were laid and then nothing. It was at this same time The Great Consolidation started to take place and over the next decade we went from thousands of providers to a literal handful. All that taxpayer money that was given to companies to lay fiber went wasted because after it was laid, the money that was left over was used by companies to buy up competitors rather than upgrading backend services to provide higher speeds.

The result is what you see today. 3 or 4 providers covering the country with the vast majority of people having only 1 or 2 providers to choose from, both offering the same high prices for the same slow speeds.

The difference between your country and ours is that private industry is supposed to react to consumer demand by providing better products/services at lower prices than their competitor. In reality, millions of dollars each year are spent bribing elected officials and those involved with decision-making of rules and regulations to prevent real free market principles from taking hold.

To be perfectly blunt, the way things are now in this country, with businesses holding sway and able to get elected officials to do their bidding, is not too far off from the way things were done in your country, and most of Eastern Europe under Soviet rule, in the past. What the people want is becoming less and less relevant with those who have the power and influence dictating how things will be.

Re:Pretty soon we'll all have exactly two choices

[BradMajors]

The United States does have a "plan": http://www.broadband.gov/plan/...

Billions in government money is available for expanding broadband.

Both have better TV then comcast

[Joe_Dragon]

DirecTV and Uverse have better TV then comcast.

Comcast can't even show all there IN MARKET RSN HD feeds or other stuff like BTN ALTs in HD or Premier League Extra Time as real channels.

Comcast is liveing in the past with loads of older boxes they still have HD boxes out there don't even have HDMI out on them.

Re:Both have better TV then comcast

[Anonymous Coward]

That may be true (I happen to agree with you that it likely is), however this is not about TV. This is about competition and removing it.

If AT&T buys out DirecTV that creates one more super-monopoly and reduces choices even more, thereby allowing everyone to raise prices and reduce quality. Nothing about this is good for consumers.

This is LESS worrying than Comcast

[mi]

If the idea of Comcast buying out Time Warner Cable to become the largest cable company in America wasn't enough to make you worry

That idea is very worrying — because it is about two competitors merging. However, with both of them being very-very cozy with the governing party, the merger is all but decided, unfortunately.

If it were to happen, it would give the combined company something on the order of 26 million TV subscribers

That's a lot, but less than the other combo and, more importantly, TV is not primary line of business for AT&T...

That said, with Internet-speeds continuing to rise — net-neutrality or not — it will only become easier to deliver content over it. Netflix may have made a special deal with Verizon, but smaller IPTV providers (like KartinaTV used by my relatives to watch channels from the former USSR and Israel) are doing just fine without any special arrangements.

Direct TV owns spectrum

[freddieb]

Direct TV owns plenty of spectrum. That's probably what ATT wants and probably would preclude the FCC granting such an action.

Dear AT&T

[slapout]

Dear AT&T,

How about using some of that money to improve your current service?

As a DirecTV subscriber...

[PRMan]

As a happy DirecTV subscriber for over 14 years who has a lifetime ban against AT&T (and really has no desire to work with multiple-time Worst Company in America holder Comcast), these actions will absolutely ensure that I become a cord-cutter.