The Federal Communications Commission yesterday popped Comcast Corporation for ice-picking Internet service customers that it suspected of watching non-Comcast video. The largest cable operator on Earth sent fake instructions that had the effect of aborting transmission and receipt of streaming movies and other programming. As the (frequently but not always clueless) FCC pointed out:

Peer-to-peer applications, including those relying on BitTorrent, have become a competitive
threat to cable operators such as Comcast because Internet users have the opportunity to view high-quality
video with BitTorrent that they might otherwise watch (and pay for) on cable television. Such video
distribution poses a particular competitive threat to Comcast’s video-on-demand (“VOD”) service.
“VOD… operates much like online video, where Internet users can select and download or stream any
available program without a schedule and watch it any time, generally with the ability to fast-forward,
rewind, or pause the programming.” Comcast has recently placed asignificant emphasis on expanding
its VOD business, and its VOD revenues have experienced robust growth. Moreover, Comcast has
“begun incorporating its VOD content online through sites competing directly with BitTorrent protocol
sites.”