Have you noticed that, if you still have a traditional land line phone service and possibly DSL, the phone company and the cable company inundate you with offers to switch to their digital services? Or that every time you call for technical support, billing questions, or anything else, they give you a hard sell to "upgrade" your service? Ever wonder why?
Traditional, copper-wire land lines are typically regulated as utilities by each state's Public Utility Commission. This goes back to the days when Ma Bell had a monopoly on phone service. Thus, when the phone company wants to raise your rates or change your service, they must get approval by the state.
State and federal regulations are outdated and have not kept up with changes in technology. The phone and cable companies see this as a huge loophole that allows them to raise your rates or limit your bandwidth on digital services, such as phone, TV and internet, at any time, and there's nothing you can do about it. In fact, my internet rates have gone up 300% in the past 3 years! The cable and phone companies, as well as the cell phone providers, have gotten consumers hooked on the drug of data and are gouging customers, with no limits to their greed.
Before I get a firestorm of anti-censorship comments from conspiracy theorists, let me say that there is no one who is more anti-censorship than I. And I believe the internet should be open to all. However, by letting the providers, who have near-virtual monopolies, continue to raise rates with no regulation, it actually RESTRICTS who is able to access the web. To make the net affordable to all, it would be in the best interest of consumers for the rates and quality of service to have some regulation by the states, or by the FCC or FTC. This may seem counter-intuitive, but look at how much your internet and cable bills have increased over the past few years, as opposed to your regulated land line bills.
The digital service providers have us by the balls, and with no regulation, things are just going to get worse.