The only reason nothing has happened in the last 3-4 years is that the huge backlash caused a *threat* of legislation that made the monopolies back off on their plans. That's not to say they have given up on them, merely realized they need time to spin the issue differently. If there were no threat of legislation there is little doubt in my mind they would have implemented their plans already.

As for it being harder to get into the industry, that's easy to say but do you have the least bit of evidence to back that up? Do you have any idea how difficult it is *now* ??

Satellite is a substandard product compared to DSL and cable due to it's high latencies and other issues. It's really not a direct competitor.

DSL provided by third parties has a history of issues due to the Telcos controlling the physical plant and not providing same level of service to the third party companies or their customers and with playing games for the fees charged to lease the lines. The third party companies are usually marginalized somewhat because of the deck being stacked against them in this way.