I think one solution would be for internet providers to upgrade their offer. They started by offering you an email box, then stopped. Some offer storage space, and a few of them offer blog platform, but they've all surrendered against facebook.
Why wouldn't internet providers offer your own personnal profile page and news feed, only instead of being stored and owned by a company whose respect for private data and business model seem contradictory, let someone you already pay something for handles it.
Then we would need protocols again, because internet providers are numerous, and don't need to dominate the world to be profitable.
Note : i can think of many other services that would be good candidates for an isp to offer : youtube, linked in, photo sharing, etc.
I would not be excited about my ISP offering these extra services. I just want them to be dumb pipes- deliver my data without messing with it in any way. That should be their only business concern, and all innovation efforts should be spent on improving their network.
Because being a simple provider of infrastructure removes any added value from your product and opens you to a price race to the bottom. Of course there will not be a slew of new ISPs given the cost of the infrastructure but it is never a good feeling when you know that people can simply ditch your service and go elsewhere without any cost.
This is what happened to the mobile market, to the PC market, is currently (somewhat) happening in small scale public transportation and (at least in Europe) has happened to food producers.
But there are several ISPs out there. Granted, it is a very hard market to get into but nevertheless there is (most of the time) more than one. Personally I'd like the Internet infrastructure be handled more like roads (i.e.: the infrastructure is technically owned by the government but built by and rented to private companies)
The downside is that you're then locked in to your ISP. People used to be trapped with their ISP just to keep their email address. It was terrible. If they host your blog on their own domain name, you're again trapped with them.
Why wouldn't internet providers offer your own personnal profile page and news feed, only instead of being stored and owned by a company whose respect for private data and business model seem contradictory, let someone you already pay something for handles it.
Then we would need protocols again, because internet providers are numerous, and don't need to dominate the world to be profitable.
Note : i can think of many other services that would be good candidates for an isp to offer : youtube, linked in, photo sharing, etc.