I think this is where I err. My analogy of us all using a shared pipeline (eg. the ISP infrastructure) is not a great one. Rather, that pipeline is partitioned

I think this is where I err. My analogy of us all using a shared pipeline (eg. the ISP infrastructure) is not a great one. Rather, that pipeline is partitioned based on how much people pay to access parts of it - the more they pay for their bandwidth, the more of the pipeline they get. And how they choose to fill their part of the pipeline is their right, and should affect only them. If the latter part is true (that it affects only them), then I think my questions are answered.