We still pay for the connection itself, which seems more on par with the historical examples. The internet has just removed needing to pay to connect to a parti

We still pay for the connection itself, which seems more on par with the historical examples. The internet has just removed needing to pay to connect to a particularly endpoint, you connect to it and then you've already paid your fee to communicate with anyone else on it. Maybe that's why all these internet services are free, they don't offer enough value proposition that another middleman can replace. It's a race to the bottom and the bottom is where we are now.