comcast

Comcast today said its proposed deal to acquire control of General Electric's NBC Universal won't get regulatory approval by the end of the year, as the company had hoped.

The cable giant issued a statement saying that even though the Federal Communications Commission and Department of Justice have made "substantial progress toward approval," it simply doesn't have enough time this year to complete the transaction, which was announced at the end of 2009.

"Because of the lead time required to prepare for a close, it now appears that we will not be able to … Read more

The public spat between Level 3 Communications and Comcast continues, as Level 3 now urges federal regulators to impose conditions on Comcast's merger with NBC Universal.

On Thursday evening, Level 3 sent a letter to the Federal Communications Commission and U.S. Department of Justice, asking the agencies to impose conditions on Comcast's impending merger that would require Comcast to allow Level 3 and other Internet backbone providers to interconnect their networks with Comcast's network for free. The company also asked that Comcast be required to connect to Internet backbone providers "on nondiscriminatory, fair, and reasonable … Read more

On today's show, McDonald's has a data breach, although it's not as bad as the one from the Mesa County, CO, sheriff's office, which apparently keeps its lists of victims, suspects, and informants in a nice, big, unprotected plain-text database. So, that's a few informants running for safe houses, then. Also, the Comcast Death Star turns its rays on Roku, Apple TV, and the like; and the Nook Color goes from awesome to officially awesome. --Molly

Comcast is trying out a new service that would provide both TV and Web content through a single set-top box.

The service, codenamed Xcalibur, would outfit subscribers with a set-box that lets them watch certain Web videos and search for live, on-demand, and recorded shows, according to The Wall Street Journal. Currently being tested by Comcast customers in Augusta, Ga., the service is seen as Comcast's response to competitors such as Google TV and Apple TV as well as subscribers cutting the cord on their cable TV subscriptions in favor of online content.

But from the Journal's description, … Read more

Two members of Congress are having some doubts about the proposed merger between Comcast and NBC Universal.

Representatives Henry Waxman (D-Calif.) and Edward Markey (D-Mass.) wrote letters to Federal Communications Commission Chairman Julius Genachowski, citing potential issues that could affect competition in the television market, as well as with how consumers are presented with content.

The Washington Post first reported on the letters.

"The proposed Comcast-NBCU transaction would allow Comcast to acquire an unprecedented concentration of national programming assets," Congressman Markey wrote to the FCC. "The joint venture would give Comcast the power, should it choose to … Read more

Comcast customers in Illinois and three other nearby states lost their Internet access last night, apparently due to the same problem that took down service for East Coast customers just a week ago.

Reports first began showing up on Twitter, with Comcast customers in several Midwest states tweeting that their connections were down. Comcast's own Twitter account, Comcastcares, later confirmed that the outage was affecting people in Minnesota, Illinois, and Michigan and seemed to be Domain Name System (DNS) related. The company also said at the time that it was working on a fix.

More specifically, the outage hit … Read more

In case you didn't hear it loud and clear the first time, Level 3 is once again accusing Comcast of setting up a toll booth on the Internet in violation of Net neutrality principles.

Earlier this week, Level 3 set off a public relations war with cable and broadband giant Comcast as it described an ongoing commercial dispute between the two companies. To sum it up, Comcast is asking Level 3 to pay a fee for sending additional traffic over the Comcast broadband network. The additional traffic, which will more than double the amount of traffic that Level 3 … Read more

Verizon's launching its LTE network on Sunday, the FCC is proposing a plan for Net neutrality tomorrow, and Google is about to take over the world EVEN MORE with its e-book venture (we're sure the EU is going to love that). Also, that deafening silence you hear on Twitter is the sound of a bunch of celebrities playing dead to raise money for AIDS. New meme: celebrity zombie impersonator accounts! Get yours today! --Molly

Internet backbone provider Level 3 says that cable giant Comcast is threatening the openness of the Internet and Comcast is accusing Level 3 of trying to get a free ride on its network.

Which one is right?

Accusations between the two companies have been flying since the end of the day Monday. Level 3 has accused Comcast of violating Net neutrality principles by insisting that Level 3 pay for sending more traffic over Comcast's network. Level 3 has recently won a contract to deliver video services for Netflix, which is the largest single producer of Internet traffic on the … Read more