<story><title>Netflix and Alphabet will need to become ISPs, fast</title><url>https://techcrunch.com/2018/06/12/netflix-and-alphabet-will-need-to-become-isps-fast/</url></story><parent_chain><item><author>pascalxus</author><text>This the end of innovation in online videos: &amp;quot;When companies like Netflix, which today closed with a market cap of almost $158 billion, can’t necessarily get enough negotiating power to ensure that consumers have direct access to them, no startup can ever hope to compete. America may believe in its entrepreneurs, but its competition laws have done nothing to keep the terrain open for them. Those implications are just beginning.&amp;quot;&lt;p&gt;Sounds like this is the end of TV and Online video watching as we know it.  Oh well, time to start reading books again ~ they&amp;#x27;ll never be able to take that from us.</text></item></parent_chain><comment><author>dsabanin</author><text>I just fail to see how Comcast or Verizon are going to be selling you their internet connection if you won&amp;#x27;t be able to connect to the things you want to connect to (like Netflix, iTunes, YouTube) through them. Especially on higher plans, people buy a lot of bandwidth so that they can stream videos, that&amp;#x27;s how ISPs up-sell to them. If they start throttling, they&amp;#x27;ll be selling an empty bucket, and it&amp;#x27;s not going to be very easy.&lt;p&gt;To me it seems like this might just revive competition between ISPs, by separating those who do the shady things and those who don&amp;#x27;t.&lt;p&gt;I&amp;#x27;m curious how this is going to play out, it may not be all bad.</text></comment>
<story><title>Netflix and Alphabet will need to become ISPs, fast</title><url>https://techcrunch.com/2018/06/12/netflix-and-alphabet-will-need-to-become-isps-fast/</url></story><parent_chain><item><author>pascalxus</author><text>This the end of innovation in online videos: &amp;quot;When companies like Netflix, which today closed with a market cap of almost $158 billion, can’t necessarily get enough negotiating power to ensure that consumers have direct access to them, no startup can ever hope to compete. America may believe in its entrepreneurs, but its competition laws have done nothing to keep the terrain open for them. Those implications are just beginning.&amp;quot;&lt;p&gt;Sounds like this is the end of TV and Online video watching as we know it.  Oh well, time to start reading books again ~ they&amp;#x27;ll never be able to take that from us.</text></item></parent_chain><comment><author>rayiner</author><text>Is it? Startups manage to continue to exist on the Google Play Store and on the iOS App Store, even though Apple and Google directly compete with many of their offerings. Consumers basically have just two choices for mobile platform, but somehow that&amp;#x27;s enough competition to keep the kind of behavior you talk about in check.</text></comment>