It seems to me the lobbying forces on the part of the content providers, Netflix et al., would be pretty formidableâ"unless they think the price is worth it to suppress upstart competition. Which is it?
I think they're getting to the point where they're willing to pay for prioritization just to guarantee quality.
A big problem is that we have a transmission protocol (TCP) that is a well deployed but incredibly stupid protocol that that intentionally floods the network with packets until it breaks, then backs off for a little while, then tries to break the network again, always trying to consume every little extra bit of buffer space and bandwidth that might be available in competition with every other server that's doing the same thing. It's constant war with attacks and retreats.
There are a least two approaches used to cope with this. One is to add bandwidth. The trouble is that TCP will greedily consume any additional bandwidth that's available and you're back to the original problem.
The second is to buy your own little slice of bandwidth and isolate your stream from all the battles going on between the other streams. This solves the problem for you but creates a kind of bandwidth aparthied. Your traffic is finally safe, but there's less bandwidth available for everyone else.
The media streamers would prefer guarantees so that their customers get the quality they pay for. Adding bandwidth doesn't provide any guarantee. Packet prioritization at the router (almost) does. We're getting to the point where Netflix, etc are willing to pay for prioritization that gives a guarantee.