Free is a misnomer and the misnomer that is driving this whole debate.

There is a cost involved with peering, even if the peering relationship is "free". That cost is the crux of much of these issues today, as Verizon (and Comcast and others) feel that Netflix should pay for their own in-house upgrades, because Netflix is creating the need for those upgrades.

Netflix argues, and I agree, that the customer is creating the demand for the data, and the customer is paying for access to the data, and the customer is paying for the infrastructure to get the data they're requesting.

OpenConnect means "You're welcome to spend a bunch of money upgrading your interconnection to our free network"