Netflix has said it is concerned about Comcast's clout, which would grow with the acquisition of Time Warner Cable, in hampering Netflix's ability to get movies and television from its servers to its subscribers' television screens.
"We continue to focus on strong net neutrality, including interconnection, to prevent large ISPs (Internet service providers) from holding our joint customers hostage with poor performance in order to extract payments from us, other Internet content firms, and Internet transit suppliers," Netflix said in a letter to shareholders.
"We will continue to advocate for the U.S. government to block the merger of Comcast/TWC or, at the very least, prevent a combined entity from charging for interconnection," the company said.
In February, Netflix struck a deal to pay Comcast for faster online delivery of its movies and TV shows through a practice known as interconnection, after customers complained about slow service.
Comcast took issue with the idea that paying for interconnection was appropriately addressed in a merger review.
"Interconnection is not a Comcast-TWC transaction specific issue," a company spokeswoman said in an email statement. "The FCC (Federal Communications Commission) is looking at this issue in an industry wide examination, which is where it should be reviewed rather than in a deal that only affects one company in the marketplace."
© Thomson Reuters 2014
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