The FCC does not understand - at a fundamental, basic level - what the internet is, or how it works.
Do you?
You need to.
You need to understand three basic things:
1. What a URL is.
2. What an IP Address is.
3. How data is routed from client to server, and back.
Answers:
1. A URL is nothing more than a human-readable IP address. (Microsoft.com is easier to remember than 23.96.52.53)
2. An IP Address is four pieces [111].[222].[333].[444]. Number 1 is the "top level domain", or, in English, ".com". Number 2 is, broadly speaking, a network ID. Number 3 is the company; aka, the word "microsoft" in our "microsoft.com" example. Number 4 identifies a specific machine at that company.
3. You type in Microsoft.com -> your web browser goes to your DNS provider and translates microsoft.com to 23.96.52.53 -> your request to connect to that machine is sent to another (random) machine which routes the request to another (sort of) random machine -> repeat until your request arrives at the machine numbered 23.96.52.53.
That machine ("53" in the IP Address) is probably a firewall or load balancer, that dissects your packet of data and looks for bad code, hacks, etc, and then repackages your request into a NEW packet, and sends it inside the Microsoft network to the machine you want to talk to. That machine then responds with an "Ok, go ahead" - which is routed through a different path - and your communications with that server begin.
That is, in a nutshell, what you need to know.
And ALL you need to know to understand the linked article, and how utterly wrong the FCC is about how the internet works.
I'm having a hard time following the EFF's argument on the first point. They're saying that the FCC is wrong that "[e]nd users do not expect to receive (or pay for) two distinct services—both Internet access service and a distinct transmission service, for example." But this doesn't seem like an incorrect statement: I don't think consumers do expect to pay for these as separate services.
Break it apart, practically, I think you will see it differently: Internet Connection: $34.99/month Bandwidth Use, up to 5Gb/mo: $49.99/month An "internet connection" in the FCC's estimation, is the wire running to the house, but NO DATA running over the wire. If you want to actually transmit data across that wire, it is an extra fee. THAT is how the FCC says the public wants the internet to work.
I don't see how that follows from their quote ... the FCC says that people "do not expect to pay for two distinct services." How is that consistent with what you're saying?