OK. I'm being downvoted presumably because I sound partisan or something, butyou don't have to assume that the people posting here are paid shills because their view is politically mainstream, lots of normal people have these views without being paid. That's all I'm saying. You don't have to assume that one view is astroturfed when there are plenty of people who will line up to defend it for free.
> you don't have to assume that the people posting here are paid shills because their view is politically mainstream
That's exactly my point. No mainstream (even partisan) view is supporting monopoly. Such views are normally expressed by corrupted politicians and paid shills. Or you are suggesting that supporting corruption is now mainstream or that some party now is officially against free market even without being corrupted?
> There is definitely a mainstream view supporting the media companies
Supporting companies against excessive regulations in general and supporting monopolies (i.e. preventing antitrust restrictions and supporting aticompetitive market capture) is not the same thing. The first should serve freeing the market. The second serves only reducing its freedom, nothing else.
Also, consider that exactly the same companies who are against enforcing Net neutrality are perfectly fine with the politicians which write for them state laws which ban competition. I.e. blatant excessive regulation, and very unhealthy one with that. Those are the same companies and politicians which at the same time scream about how bad regulation will be if Net neutrality will be enforced. Hypocrisy much? Or may be they simply are against regulation which weakens their monopoly and pro regulation which strengthens it?
As you can see it has nothing to do with partisan or "mainstream" views on regulation in general. It's about greedy monopolists and their bought corrupted bureaucrats. Who in their normal mind would voluntarily support such a thing?
It might be tinfoil, but it makes one wonder why a significant net neutrality opponent (Verizon) is considering purchasing the largest (monetary) proponent (AOL). Granted VZN and AOL had joint ventures previously, but sealing such a deal would have a chilling effect.
