[mikester]

I'm surprised people don't make this comparison more often. In the dawn of the internet you paid for an online service by the minute.

then they went to 'unlimited usage!'

We have (had?) 'unlimited usage* (gbps)' for internet and internet enabled phones.

*not to exceed 5gb per month or some nonesense that does not equal unlimited even though that is the word they use

Now Comcast is publicly capping data usage on their cable networks (250gb per month I think). ATT announces these plans plus a tethering CHARGE! You're going to have to PAY to enable TETHERING!!!

Verizon will do exactly the same thing - they have been discussing it and are the worst about killing folks off their network if they over use on their 'unlimited' plans. When they first started putting out those EVDO cards and we used them where I worked we got plenty of warning letters from them over users using more than 5gbs.

We're back to the 'per x' charges. StomachMonkey is right - it really could become an 'internet tax' sort of situation if you access a 'defined premium' site and are on a basic tier of internet access. It would be tragic to the consumer I think since there really isn't a good mechanism to encourage competition.

You can say 'open access' like the telcos must provide to their lines but Comcast is ordered to do this in a few markets and allow Earthlink on their lines. Earthlink must adhere to Comcast's caps as well. There is no competition there - it's Comcast's way or the highway. So even though you get your bill from Earthlink - you're a Comcast customer.

I've worked for ISP's in the past and worked in instances where open access was a requirement and it is a joke. The cable provider still has to manage everything about the other compay's 'customers'.

The only option I feel is for the infrastructure to be either publicly owned or the conduit to be publicly owned. In that case a company could run their own fiber in the conduit to a neighborhood and provide services and competition. Letting the companies dig and own the lines blocks out any form of competition at all.

I live in the greater Los Angeles area. Time Warner and Charter are the only cable provider these days (10 years ago there were 4 locally). Charter pretty much just has Long Beach I think. In my neighborhood I can't get DSL. I can get a satellite but I can't get DSL for internet access. I can't get FIOS, my only choice is Earthlink (which I had for a while) via Time Warner or Time Warner directly.

Competition in the cable tv/Internet/cellular industry is a joke. I have an iPhone and I really like it - I hate Apple and the way they do things but the iPhone really is awesome. An iPad is probably a little more than I need so if falls off the awesome train. There is no competition on the iPhone platform in the US - I guess if you really feel strongly enough you can get a different phone.