Non-discrimination rules for ISPs and vertical integration: Lessons from cable television

The experience of cable television indicates that vertically integrated ISPs have plausible incentives to favor their affiliated content and to restrict entry of nascent rival content services, but these incentives are weakened in some respects, and strengthened in others, by differences in the economic architectures of cable and Internet broadband. Non-discrimination regulations designed to control such behavior are potentially more effective than in cable, but rules governing discrimination both in the upstream access and the downstream retail markets (as the FCC's no-unreasonable-discrimination rule appears to do) are likely to be necessary for effectiveness. Beneficial effects of vertical integration on financing and entry of cable programming networks should also apply to Internet video content development, but emergence since the 1970s of a robust programming supply industry with few vertical ties to cable suggests that such benefits will be less significant in the ISP case. Finally, the history of both the cable and ISP industries makes evident that the fundamental policy concern should not be vertical integration but horizontal market shares of ISPs, both at the local and national levels.     

Regulation of the Canadian cable industry: A comparative analysis

The Canadian and US cable television industries have similar economic characteristics and market structures, yet each has a distinct mix of programme services and a different history of development. These differences are largely due to a different economic status in each country, cultural peculiarities and contrasting theories of regulation. The US regulatory environment is gradually moving toward a laissez-faire market approach while in Canada more traditional and formal rules still apply which constrict economic behaviour. This difference in regulatory philosophy is most evident in the treatment of pay television. Canadian regulatory policy has given rise to rules which are at variance with economic incentives and efficiency.     

The diffusion of television advertising

This study is an empirical examination of the diffusion of the use of network television advertising by manufacturing firms. The results indicate that manufacturers of consumer goods were likely to make use of television advertising sooner than manufacturers of producer goods and that, among producers of consumer goods, those producing more easily differentiable products were likely to adopt sooner than those producing more standardized products. Manufacturers of products sold in larger geographic markets were found to adopt sooner than those producing products sold in smaller markets. Larger market share was also found to induce earlier adoption of television advertising.     

Still on hold? A retrospective analysis of competitive implications of the Telecommunication Act of 1996, on its 10th year anniversary

This study provides a retrospective analysis exploring competition in the US telecommunication industry, a decade after passage of the highly deregulatory Telecommunications Act of 1996. Using history as a guide, it reviews recent merger activity facilitated by the Act, profiles the present state of concentration in cable and telephony and explores prospects for cross-media competition permitted by the Act.     

Effects of broadband availability on total factor productivity in service sector firms: Evidence from Ireland

While broadband is widely believed to augment productivity, there is little firm-level evidence of a generalised causal effect. In this paper we examine whether the introduction of digital subscriber line (DSL) broadband services increased firms' productivity in nine sub-sectors within the services and distribution sector in Ireland from 2006 to 2012. Firm-level panel data on firms' characteristics are linked to spatial information on the rollout of DSL. While we do not find significant productivity effects in the services sectors taken together, we do find positive and significant effects on firm's total factor productivity in Information & Communication and Administrative & Support Services.