antitrust
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Mediacom files antitrust lawsuit against Sinclair
Mediacom Communications, the eighth-largest cable provider in the United States, has filed an antitrust lawsuit against Sinclair Communications in Federal court, alleging that the broadcaster has attempted to force higher fees on cable and satellite providers by only allowing carriage if Mediacom pays fees to bundle stations in other markets. Sinclair Broadcast Group, Inc., is one of the largest television broadcasters in the country. Sinclair owns, operates, or services 58 local television stations in 36 markets, reaching 22% of television households in the United States. Sinclair is well known among providers for refusing to allow providers to carry certain channels if they haven't paid up Sinclair's fees, while attempting to get them to pay fees for other markets as well. Now Mediacom is fighting back, filing in an Iowa Federal court that Sinclair has overstepped its legal bounds and used its monopoly powers to tie station carriage unfairly. Those with Sinclair in their markets will surely be rooting for Mediacom on this case, as we would hate to be watching Fox, NBC, ABC, CBS, CW or any of the other Sinclair-owned stations in standard-def -- if even at all -- just because of unfair business tactics.
Microsoft warns Europe of possible Vista delays
First the PS3, now this. Microsoft is warning that their oft delayed, Windows Vista operating system might be delayed even further in Europe due to "unclear antitrust guidance" from the European Commission. Apparently this all began in a letter from the commission to Steve Ballmer in March with concerns that some of the features in Vista would breach the same laws XP violated a few years back. According to Microsoft, they proposed some changes but never heard back, saying "Once we receive the commission's response, we will know whether the commission is seeking additional product design changes that would result in delay in Europe." Tit for tat, a spokesman for the commission's antitrust division said Microsoft's statement was "misleading to imply that the commission could be the cause of delays. It is not up to us to tell Microsoft what it has to do to Vista, the onus is on Microsoft to design its product in conformity with European competition laws, which it is well aware of." Meow! So is this just legal posturing by Microsoft in their never-ending European antirust battle or a bit of preemptive blame-shifting in case of further delay? We don't know. But hey, Europe, consider yourselves warned.
