> This is the same that Verizon/Comcast wants to do. Provide an arbitrary service (i.e ISP) and also do something else with the data. > Maybe someone can help

> This is the same that Verizon/Comcast wants to do. Provide an arbitrary service (i.e ISP) and also do something else with the data. > Maybe someone can help me understand the distinction between these two. The difference lies in that it's rather easy to escape Google's purview -- if you don't like Gmail, you can pay for any one of multiple paid email services that don't monetise anything beyond your credit card. I do exactly that. With Comcast/Verizon, it's a lot harder to access an alternative service -- both have spent decades building up nationwide networks and use their quasi-monopoly statuses in anti-competitive ways (at every level and scale, see stuff like municipal/local rules around utility poles and other rights-of-way for fibre and coax). It's trivial for me to shell out a few dollars per month to access another email service that doesn't do ads and doesn't monetise my data. It's orders of magnitude more painful and expensive for me to access internet with something other than the duopoly of shitty DSL or shitty Comcast DOCSIS service.