"Barbara van Schewick, Director of Stanford Law School’s Center for Internet and Society and a leading expert on net neutrality, argues that Stream TV contravenes the FCC’s open internet policy because Comcast is engaging in economic discrimination, through zero-rating, and technical discrimination, by giving its own video service preferential treatment.
“From a policy perspective, this is an obvious violation of net neutrality principles,” van Schewick told Motherboard. “What Comcast is doing is a textbook example of an ISP using its gatekeeper power to pick winners and losers online, and that is one of the core things that the FCC’s open internet rules were designed to prevent.”
Van Schewick says the Stream TV controversy has implications that go beyond zero-rating and net neutrality, and could affect the competitive dynamics of the national video market as a whole.
“The cable TV market is extremely concentrated, which is why the FCC has so much hope that online video will bring greater competition,” said van Schewick. “If they allow cable giants to leverage their market power to stifle online video services, it will have killed their hope of bringing greater competition to the market.”"