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Comment by kpwags | Hacker News Reader

This seems rather anti-competitive. It'd just be a matter of time until Netflix, etc. only run well on the upgraded speed.

Here's hoping someone takes this to the FTC and gets this stopped. I wish I were a little more hopeful.

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Im very surprised this doesn't violate the bundling antitrust laws [1]

[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bundling_(antitrust_law)

IANAL but my understanding is that bundling is only an antitrust violation when you have a monopoly. They were already offering cable/internet bundles in these areas with cost savings, so I don't see how this changes anything from the antitrust standpoint.

They are a monopoly in many areas

maybe in some areas, but where they're doing this in Oregon/SW Washington, they have enough competition to not be considered a monopoly.

so, in these specific cases, it probably doesn't apply.

> It'd just be a matter of time until Netflix, etc. only run well on the upgraded speed

I think you overestimate the bandwidth requirements of Netflix.

I only have a 30 mbps internet connection, and even that's more than enough for Netflix's highest bitrates.

Source: https://help.netflix.com/en/node/306

I used to run Netflix just fine with a 10mbps line (roughly 8mbps effective), although that was "only" at HD I think.

Comcast will throttle traffic from Netflix to well below acceptable levels unless you're on one of their approved plans.

Remember, net neutrality is no longer a thing.

> It'd just be a matter of time until Netflix, etc. only run well on the upgraded speed.

I don't think this is true. Netflix and co have an incentive to run well on the lowest common denominator connection.

Sure you might not get 4K, but you can watch pretty much anything in their streaming library uninterrupted on 10Mbps of bandwidth.

Very unlikely that Netflix will have any problems whatsoever at any of the speeds being discussed. Netflix only needs around 10Mbps to run very, very well.

Netflix also has CDN caches all over Comcast's nodes.

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