Well, the reason it works for all-you-can-eat video services is that the cable companies are providing a distribution service to the content owners. So for HBO, they provide both cable distribution and caching of video for HBO Go. They could pretty easily do the same for Netflix; considering Netflix is basically HBO that's sold outside the cable companies at this point. HBO does in effect pay the cable companies for distribution in that the cable companies take a percentage of the monthly HBO subscription fee that the customer pays, so I don't see why Netflix shouldn't.
I think a lot of geeks are in love with net neutrality because they see it as a fairness thing and think it will keep the cable companies from gouging them. In reality, it's just about cost allocation. Companies are going to take their profits under net neutrality or not; and the profit margins on cable aren't astronomically high. Netflix would never have gotten off the ground under true network neutrality; the costs have to be allocated somewhere.
If you want pure speed though; metered billing is the way to go. Look at how fast mobile data has become in the US relative to the rest of the world -- a large part of that is because it's profitable for Verizon and AT&T to have customers use more data. Businesses are going to make their profits and regulation isn't going to have much effect on the prices that consumers pay -- but under the right rules, if you create a situation where companies can make more money by providing a better service, everyone wins.
I think a lot of geeks are in love with net neutrality because they see it as a fairness thing and think it will keep the cable companies from gouging them. In reality, it's just about cost allocation. Companies are going to take their profits under net neutrality or not; and the profit margins on cable aren't astronomically high. Netflix would never have gotten off the ground under true network neutrality; the costs have to be allocated somewhere.
If you want pure speed though; metered billing is the way to go. Look at how fast mobile data has become in the US relative to the rest of the world -- a large part of that is because it's profitable for Verizon and AT&T to have customers use more data. Businesses are going to make their profits and regulation isn't going to have much effect on the prices that consumers pay -- but under the right rules, if you create a situation where companies can make more money by providing a better service, everyone wins.