Once upon a time, if you wanted to trade in your borough, you'd set up a stall and start trading. Your startup costs would be the materials for your stall, and your goods to sell. Eventually, people started "owning land", and in order to trade, you'd have to pay your local baron a levy, tax, or rent. This status quo has been maintained since, and mobility within the structure only arose as a result of vast technical and ensuing societal change (the industrial revolution).
We are watching the ascension of the new barons. They will hold their privilege with an iron fist, for as long as they hold it, they define the playing field. They would be foolhardy not to.
The barrier to entry will indeed rise, as peering costs will end up passed on to content producers rather than consumers - consumers will not accept the cost rises, and market competition on the ISP side will ensure this doesn't arise - but on the supply side, large players can and will pay for an advantage, and small players will either be subsumed or destroyed. New entrants will need to be well armed indeed.
Now, this isn't quite the same as the feudal picture as previously described, as the barriers will at first be monetary rather than cultural, and have not yet had time to thoroughly entrench. If this is allowed to persist as is, however, without resistance or concern, we will indeed find ourselves in a entrenched technocracy of the foulest dimensions, with very little recourse for anyone without access to vast capital.
We are watching the ascension of the new barons. They will hold their privilege with an iron fist, for as long as they hold it, they define the playing field. They would be foolhardy not to.
The barrier to entry will indeed rise, as peering costs will end up passed on to content producers rather than consumers - consumers will not accept the cost rises, and market competition on the ISP side will ensure this doesn't arise - but on the supply side, large players can and will pay for an advantage, and small players will either be subsumed or destroyed. New entrants will need to be well armed indeed.
Now, this isn't quite the same as the feudal picture as previously described, as the barriers will at first be monetary rather than cultural, and have not yet had time to thoroughly entrench. If this is allowed to persist as is, however, without resistance or concern, we will indeed find ourselves in a entrenched technocracy of the foulest dimensions, with very little recourse for anyone without access to vast capital.