content: government sanctioned stranglehold  Because it has to be.  Utilities are natural monopolies, because there is not enough room in the existing tunnels in my city to drag 4 companies lines for every service, and it would literally cost hundreds of millions to add more runs of fiber rather than just replacing the existing lines. But all these fucking conservatives are against any regulation on Comcast and centurylink, so I pay $65 for 8Mbps, while a town of 150 people 20 miles away has municipal fiber of 50Mbps for $20.