FCC hearing Comcast dispute over the hiring of the seat heaters

Comcast keeps on shooting itself in the foot, this time with the appointment of the seat heaters in its hearing before the FCC.

Disputes arose during Comcast Corp. ’s for the treatment of hearing subscribers Internet traffic on Wednesday at Harvard Law School. The organizer of the hearing argued that the federal Internet service provider allegedly “hot seat” in order to prevent others from attending the entry into the room.

Comcast had no doubts about its agreement with the prosecution. The company told reporters that it had hired an undisclosed number of people to “hold” seats for the Boston area Comcast employees. The seat heaters are to yield their seats to all employees once they arrived at the hearing.

According to Catherine Bracy, administrative manager at Harvard’s Berkman Center for Internet and Society, even after the hearing had begun did many of those hired seat heaters remain where they were. He said that over three dozen engagements arrived at the scene hours before, snatched up the seats, and where he stayed for the whole event, while people trying to enter were rejected.

“I think it’s wrong to say that they are places for the holding of Comcast employees,” Bracy told the Associated Press. “No employees came in to take seats when the event began.”

Comcast spokesman, Sena Fitzmaurice, said that the idea of hiring heaters seat was to combat advocacy group, Free Press, for his lobbying for funds to attend.

The hearing at Harvard Law School came after complaints were filed that Comcast was meddling with the P2P traffic by impersonating computer users.

Robert Kenny, spokesman for the FCC, refused to comment on the actions of Comcast.