I heartily disagree with this approach. Not only does it harken back to the days of Prodigy, AOL, CompuServe and the like where each service had its own content, but it's very anti-internet.
>Make users want to switch
That's great if there are alternatives to switch to.
Yes, I could technically switch to dialup. It is technically internet. It's not going to allow me to do any work or any of my hobbies, however. So I don't consider it a valid option.
Yes, I could also try out some kind of dish provider. If I wanted to chop down some trees. Besides, those also don't work for me (almost no upload bandwidth, and horrible latency issues).
>instead of just pretend like there's no alternatives.
I live in an area where Comcast literally is my only option for high-speed internet. I'm not pretending.
IIRC most of the country lives in areas where there are only 1 or 2 broadband options. The non-cable operator is likely to be a Baby Bell that's also spent heavily to lobby the FCC to kill net neutrality and so wouldn't be an effective protest switch.
For instance, in most of Metro-Atlanta, you can get Comcast or AT&T UVerse (AT&T being the name of what was a Baby Bell, Cingular). UVerse is simply slow-as-shit DSL and is awful. (Fun fact: AT&T tried to sell and promote UVerse as Fiber in the mid-2000s. My parents have fiber in their home but no way to get a fiber provider -- AT&T was over-selling them on a "fiber" solution that was literally just copper DSL wires. The whole telecom industry is full of crooks).
In New York City, you basically have one provider. If you're very lucky and live in an area Verizon (another former baby bell) also services, you can get Fiber -- and that's awesome -- but the zoning for this stuff is often street by street. The building across the street from my apartment can get Verizon. My building can't -- for whatever reason. Verizon did tell me they could probably rig me access if I could get them access to the basement -- but I'm not the building owner and I don't have time to deal with what happens when the line gets cut accidentally.
I'm very fortunate that my Internet/TV provider is relatively sane (Cablevision) -- if I lived three blocks further away, I'd be stuck in TWC hell.
What most consumers also don't know is that in many areas, the cable provider can be chosen by the property management company (if you're in an apartment complex) or the condo association. So what happens is that operators will "bid" on that area - and the lowest bid wins. The problem is, even if you live in a Comcast or Verizon or whatever area, you still can't get that service. You're required to be with whoever your property management or co-op board chose. I actually didn't buy a condo that was in a great location and had a great floorplan because of their choice of ISP/cable provider.
The whole system is fucked. It really is. And the net neutrality and fast-lane aspects are only a small part of a much more broken and corrupt system.
That said, just because we can't fix the whole system -- and we can't -- doesn't mean we can't put pressure on companies to not fuck customers over even more, by making access-agreements for content. The system is already not in our favor -- no reason to make it even worse.
Anti-internet to ban an ISP that is trying to decimate the internet? How does that logically make any sense?
What would we end up with? Most of the internet not working for anybody. Friends sending you links that you can't get to because you're on different ISPs. Needing to buy service at more than one ISP to "provide coverage". If it happened on a large enough scale, it would unravel what we know as the internet.
This is what I mean when I say it's a bad idea.
I absolutely want to switch and will as soon as an alternative is available. In my entire life, I've never lived in a place that had anything other than Comcast. And I've always lived in relatively dense areas.
Let me guess, if you all were naturalists, you would all live in the heart of New York and complain to your neighbors (but not your city) all day about the lack of green.
There's no pretending, there are no alternatives.
ISP access has weight when I'm considering moving which is sad.
Not unlimited. Unlimited for 'phone usage' but not for legitimate usage outside your phone.
That's great, I'm really excited to hear that! Let me know what number I can call to sign up!
I could shop at Walmart and have an extra 20 bucks for my internet bill. Instead, I choose the slower internet with the ethical provider so that I can shop not at Walmart.
Not to say I'm perfect by any means, but this is just an example of the decisions I try to make every day. These decisions are hard sometimes.
Giving up on all of my hobbies that require internet, and having my fiancee to the same, is not practical. Paying more for internet is not practical. This is not an unreasonable position to take, nor does it represent some tragic moral failure on my part.
In any case, it's a thought experiment that's not worth defending myself further, because there are no alternatives to Comcast where I live.