Feb

27

Comcast Pays People to Fill Seats at Recent FCC Hearings.

sascha's picture

There's something blatantly wrong about the notion of packing a public meeting with paid seat-warmers -- even more so when these seat-warmers are being paid just to fill seats that would otherwise go to interested public participants. To be clear, members of the public were kept out of the recent hearings because Comcast paid people to take up seats and sleep through the hearing:


Both Conde Nast's Portfolio.com and SavetheInternet.com have been covering the story as it unfolds.

I would hope that the FCC would investigate this behavior -- it makes a joke of the entire notion of a public hearing if the very companies being investigated can pay their way out of a public hearing by packing the room with paid seat-fillers.

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  1. Tom Poe (not verified) on Wed, 2008-02-27 08:27

    This issue doesn't come up in Japan, as everyone can attend from their home computers. :)

  2. sascha on Wed, 2008-02-27 09:11

    The FCC did stream the content -- though the FCC broadcast of the Comcast hearings were in the proprietary Real Audio format. That said, I haven't found the video archives yet -- so if you spot them, please let me know. I've heard that Dave Reed's comments were particularly interesting (I've been lurking on an ongoing e-mail discussion with Dave and other luminaries since the hearings and the discourse has been quite illuminating).


  3. sascha on Wed, 2008-02-27 09:22

    AP covers Comcast's attempt to pack the FCC hearings with paid seat-warmers. So it looks like the story is beginning to get out. Comcast actually blames Free Press for their malfeasance, claiming that because Free Press was getting word out to the general public to show up at the hearing that they had to pay people to fill seats.


  4. sascha on Thu, 2008-02-28 10:22

    The FCC has put audio up here:

    http://www.fcc.gov/realaudio/agendameetings.html


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