> Not your fault, of course, but it kills me that consumers in most areas in the US let the ISP market die. The monopoly players gave great intro prices and the

> Not your fault, of course, but it kills me that consumers in most areas in the US let the ISP market die. The monopoly players gave great intro prices and they all jumped ship. It's not just that - we subsidized the construction of the Internet channels with our tax dollars, and then the government essentially handed over the control of those to the private companies, who now claim that they can charge whatever they want for access to "their" lines. Consumers may have played a role, but at the end of the day, it's the government (the constituents)[1] who have sanctioned the existing monopolies. > I'm also sad that our competition regulators allowed this to happen. A pseudo-choice between two basically equivalent options isn't enough for the magic of the free market to work. Choice? 80% of consumers have zero choice in their ISP. For me, the only alternative is 'no Internet'. [1] Obviously consumers == constituents for the most part, but I make the distinction to draw attention to the fact that they would need to act in their role as voters/citizens, not as consumers, if they want to change anything.