>maybe you can try our competitors... wait, there are none? oops...
>Without net neutrality, Comcast can look at the traffic they are receiving from Level3, examine it and say: "Okay, customer, you can have these packets from Google but these packets from Netflix...
You dont need net neutrality to fix this, you need to undo regulatory capture, government granted geographic monopolies, and foster last mile competition. If my mom wants to buy cheaper internet that just has facebook and netflix, and I want to buy "unfiltered" and there are competing last mile services offering both, you dont need more laws telling the isps what they can and cant do, or what we are allowed to buy. The companies that own the lines should be neutral utilities, and the companies selling the service to end users should be allowed to come up with creative business models. At that point netflix could even start offering its own service, upon other companies rented lines.
Every problem you spell out in your post exists because the customer doesnt have the choice to leave a shitty company. Last miles should be be open to any company willing to pay market rate.
The answer to regulatory capture, is not more regulatory capture.
I think you completely missed the point. The internet has value as a digital market, communications platform, tool for free speech and human rights preservation and a lot more, and much of that value comes from the fact that any participant, no matter where they are (obviously assuming they are not blocked or restricted for malicious activity intended to disrupt the service in the first place) can send a message to any IP address and that message will get there. So:
> the companies selling the service to end users should be allowed to come up with creative business models
No, they shouldn't; not if this requires breaking the global internet. It's not worth it. Why should the fact that it's possible to work around specific resulting issues in the USA mean it's desirable to go down a path that benefits ISPs and (dubiously) a small subset of consumers, and literally no one else? You might tell me it will benefit most consumers (as in, ISP customers), but that's shortsighted. The loss of flexibility incurred from the destruction of the system and the loss of the global digital market will have negative consequences for almost everyone down the road.
Or to put it in other words, stop looking at this as if it was a primarily economic problem tied to the availability of internet access choices for the customers of certain ISPs. Those things hardly matter in the bigger picture. They certainly do not matter to me, an european citizen. We have real net neutrality legislation in the EU. But it still matters to me if my business (should I have one) cannot reach american users and customers properly. It matters to me if it's hard for me to exchange ideas with americans, like we're doing right now. It matters to me if I can't play videogames against my american friends. That's worse for the economy and worse for consumer choice.
>Without net neutrality, Comcast can look at the traffic they are receiving from Level3, examine it and say: "Okay, customer, you can have these packets from Google but these packets from Netflix...
You dont need net neutrality to fix this, you need to undo regulatory capture, government granted geographic monopolies, and foster last mile competition. If my mom wants to buy cheaper internet that just has facebook and netflix, and I want to buy "unfiltered" and there are competing last mile services offering both, you dont need more laws telling the isps what they can and cant do, or what we are allowed to buy. The companies that own the lines should be neutral utilities, and the companies selling the service to end users should be allowed to come up with creative business models. At that point netflix could even start offering its own service, upon other companies rented lines.
Every problem you spell out in your post exists because the customer doesnt have the choice to leave a shitty company. Last miles should be be open to any company willing to pay market rate.
The answer to regulatory capture, is not more regulatory capture.