Like everyone else here I freaked out a bit when I started reading about this whole issue of internet neutrality, I am dependent on the internet for running my internet based businesses so I have a bit more at stake than the average internet user. Within the last year I have become an avid Linux user and have fairly recently begun making use of remote access technology so that I can access my servers using my laptop as I have the Verizon Wireless Network (which allows me to access the internet from just about anywhere as long as I am fairly close to an urban area). I will go into more detail about why this is important and could affect this issue in a positive way:

My average Verizon Wireless network speed is about 150K kb per second download rate. I have a Cox Cable internet plan for my servers and the download rate for this service maxes out at 9 MB per second, so there is obviously a huge difference in the connecion speeds.

The program that I use which allows me to access my servers from my laptop is called FreeNX (http://freenx.berlios.de/ ), this software is amazing as it allows me to use my slow Verizon connection to remotely access my servers. Unlike other remote acces technologies (such as VNC and ones for Windows), FreeNX actually provides near local speeds even over a slow connection.. what this means is that when I access my servers, with a download speed of 9 MB per servers, from my laptop over the Verizon connection I can browse the internet at the 9MB speed despite the fact that I am using only a 150K KB connection.

I don't fully understand exactly how the FreeNX technology works so well but it truly is amazing how it is able to put the screen of the remote machine (with very good image quality) through slow connections.

It is not far-fetched to think that this could be applied to dial-up connections (the FreeNX technology is still in a fairly early stage and has potential to be better perfected to provide optimal perforance over a dial-up connection), if the cable companies want to stop providing true internet access to customers then for those customers who want to still be able to access the real internet will simply need a dial-up connection, they would then buy an account with a company who would be based in a location (either in the US or abroad), where high speed true internet access is available (there's no way that net neutrality will end in every country.. some developing countries could use that as a selling point to get US businesses to move there if this mess actually does start here). Companies in these remote locations would be similar to current web hosting companies... they buy up huge amounts of bandwith and server space and they start selling accounts to customers in the US. All the customer would need is the fastest dial-up connection they can get and the client for FreeNX (which is available for both Windows and Linux machines) to be able to access this high speed account.

Sure this wouldn't be a perfect solution but it would certainly beat out the option of simply just going back to dial-up and I for one would be very interested to get in on this type of business but of course I am hoping that it won't ever come to this. Anyways, I encourage everyone who hasn't heard of FreeNX before or who doesn't yet use Linux to check it out as it seems at least to me that the incredible brain power behind this open source movement can beat out anything that these monopolists who are clinging to a long ago era can throw at us.