You are paying for the physical infrastructure. Your ISP connects the physical cables to your house/apartment that allow you to access the Internet. Google Chrome, Edge, Firefox, Safari… Are the digital portals to the web and search engines let you “serf” the web. We only pay for 1 service the physical. If we banned data we’d pay for at least 2 if not all 3 plus individual sites
What web browser are you using to get to this site? Unless you’re on dialup you’re accessing the Internet through a web browser that uses data to pay for the upkeep of the servers
It’s not a false dichotomy, the companies that give us access to the Internet like Google need to make money in one way or another, they sell our user data to other companies which then give targeted ads to us. If we banned the use of user data it would require a monthly subscription
We pay an ISP because they have to maintenance on a massive physical structure to keep running properly. We do not pay for the Internet, some websites charge money but Google and the general web is free to use.
The rich pretend they’re all powerful but really they have a much less secure money source. Where as we know our money is ours the rich can lose everything like that. Elon could go broke in a single day he’s on his way out of the billionaire club because now everyone hates him