In reality, what the cable company is saying is this:
Hey, want a grape? Sorry, you need to buy a whole bundle of grapes. More than you could ever eat for yourself. Pay up. Oh, you want to share your grapes? Nope, sorry, you're not allowed to share those grapes you paid for. You're only allowed to buy the entire bundle so you yourself can eat one grape. You may not share your grapes with anyone else. [...] and oh: by the way you're only allowed to buy the ultra-mega-superfamily sizes of each food item.
Gosh, that's an excellent analogy!!
Yep, in Canada the monopoly is, I believe, even more present than in the US. Where I live, my starting option is $61.60/mo and I can choose between two whole companies. And then it required me to pay $60+ to cancel on less than 30 days notice (I believe new legislation makes this illegal as of very recently), and then charged me $108 for the modem I'd returned (until I spent considerable time pursuing that matter).
If we go over the beginning limit (highly unlikely since it's so high), we pay more. As it stands, my neighbours use theirs only a few weeks of each year, and I told them if my use ever causes their bill to increase to let me know and I will pay that overage, half of all of it, whatever they wish.
This question could get into all sorts of interesting discussions... How many people should be allowed to use one internet account? Only the one person whose name is on the account? If not, who can he share it with? Only people related by blood inside the same dwelling? Related by marriage inside the same dwelling? If a poly marriage, only the first two people that met? Are four kids too many for a family? What about guests? Roommates? The tenant in the basement suite or carriage house? This is all where my brain has no idea the ethics of sharing, but Sid Hoffman's analogy about being forced to buy only the giant size packs and then not share them out... That would make me pure evil, because I'm always sharing the excess of anything I have, and have been known to buy in bulk with the sole intention of sharing, either giving others the proportionate deal or a freebie.
As far as I can tell, the internet company is offering a certain amount of GB per $61.60, and charges more if a given glom of humans uses more than that amount via that account.
(With real grapes, though, I take just the portion I need -like, six- from the bigger bags and pay for just those. Sometimes I imagine the stores might not like that, but it seems reasonable to me. I also do things like put different bulk candies into the same bag -for the planet- but put only the highest price ticket number on the whole shebang, which I think is a win for me (I like only a few of each), a win for the planet, and a win for the store.)