So far there has only been one filing against Comcast Cable in New York State. The law suit claims Comcast was sending "drop signals" when connections went on past a certain file size or bandwidth limit. Comcast claims they have the right to disconnect any suspicious behaviour or otherwise unprofitable environments.

The contraversy remains valid that when a consumer enters into a service agreement that says nothing about "throttling" or "dropping" Internet packets they can expect to be able to use the Internet for whatever serves their purpose.

The problem that large cable companies have is simple...they see their profits dwindling on extra services and add-ons that would normally just proliferate their margins. The Internet has a plethera of resources that potentially deter customers from watching TV (and ultimately the commercials paying their bills) like free movie downloads, cable TV shows available without commercial interruption online, cheap movie rental downloads, bit torrents (file sharing), P2P file sharing (like Kazaa and Bearshare).

There are rumors circulating arround the Internet that would suggest cable companies are about to shift to a much more intrusive form of advertising online. Say, for example, you are searching for a new home across town. You log on to your favorite MLS site and view about 20 properties each with 10 photos downloaded for your viewing. The cable company can meter that session just like the power company meters your light bill. With each download you incur a fee, albiet a small one, until you reach the end of the month and the top of you limit...at which time your Internet will be turned off until you purchase some more.

Speculation is a powerful thing but in our case it's factual. Advertising is the only real advantage to TV and the Internet is encroaching on that turf more and more every day.