One thing to think of might be to apply your "feeling in your gut" to the landline system.

There were never charges if you had both AT&T service and phones - but called someone with a competitors service. There was never "government oversight" of the conversations or people you could call without quality or charge changes either without proper warrants (again Patriot Act not withstanding).

The metaphor breaks down slightly due to the existence of long distance charges, but taking everything on the local level - you weren't discriminated on what ISP you dialed, who you talked to, or what was said. We can compare "minutes" that were offered vs bandwidth offered on the internet, and toll calls can be compared to subscription services (you still need a provider and service)

One thing to further add: there still is the idea of "off-peak" usage that's in use today. These rates never discriminated against the content of the usage, and electric companies can't directly charge you more if you have a GE washer vs a Samsung washer. The rates were the same regardless of what or who is being served. (BUT if they could - the current arguments would be exactly the same: "we can introduce cost saving plans!" But at the cost of choice in what you use or what you're exposed to)