Many of these ISPs are shitty because they service the hardest to reach places. Comcast and Verizon have gobbled up billions in government aid to bring service to rural areas and end up delivering only to fringe areas which they can reach easily. The small companies end up struggling to get the government cash and end up underfunded providing service to the absolute-most difficult to reach consumers. It's a real crappy deal.

Arguably satellite service erases all of this and is a hard reset on rural telecommunications. Unfortunately, it's not a industry small businesses can participate in.