The "sweeping change" is an old legal standard: "common carrier". They're contracted to move bytes from source A to customer B at "up to" X Mbps; so long as (albeit limited) bandwidth is available at any given moment, fill the pipe and shove that data thru regardless of source. Traffic shaping may be fair if the pipe is full, but not if unused bandwidth remains sparsely used based solely on source or content.

Raise your hand if you've contacted your elected representative regarding ISPs becoming Common Carriers.

(Full disclosure, I'm not an American and thus have little to no say regrading American ISPs, but I advocate for this in my home country.)

/me largely expects crickets in response.

Unfortunately I think we just aren't pissed off enough about this as a group yet, evidenced by the lack of action from us and from legislators.

Raise your hand if your elected representative has any idea what having ISPs become Common Carriers means or entails. Keep your hand up if 10% of your district also knows. Keep your hand up if you (and your district collectively) can out lobby Comcast, TWC, ATT, Verizon, etc.

I don't know that it's that people aren't pissed off, its probably more that the people who are pissed off are uninformed, will not become informed easily, and will not organize as easily as already well organized and very well funded corporations, lobbyists, and PACs.

I think this might be a clear description of what would happen if roads became privatized.

Imagine UPS as Netflix and a turnpike operator as Verizon.

Or just call it a toll road. Of course those tolls will go up every year for things like maintenance and improvements and other esoteric vagaries....