Cohen: TWC 'Asks' Should Not Be Cloaked in Public Interest

Comcast executive VP David Cohen Wednesday hammered home his criticism of Netflix and other Time Warner Cable deal critics, saying Discovery was the "poster child" for inappropriate complaints being made by programmers, and that Netflix had tried to dump traffic and slow its user's online experience in order to shift interconnection costs from itself to Comcast.

Cohen talked to reporters Wednesday about the Company's voluminous reply comments at the FCC (something close to 1,000 pages including exhibits).

He was asked about his tough charges that some of the critics were trying to extort various "asks" from the company in exchange for their support or at least silence on the deal, or that the deal's public advocacy groups were "chicken little" with shopworn arguments.

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John Eggerton

Contributing editor John Eggerton has been an editor and/or writer on media regulation, legislation and policy for over four decades, including covering the FCC, FTC, Congress, the major media trade associations, and the federal courts. In addition to Multichannel News and Broadcasting + Cable, his work has appeared in Radio World, TV Technology, TV Fax, This Week in Consumer Electronics, Variety and the Encyclopedia Britannica.