[omegaham]

Comcast owns NBC. They want to have a large news audience to fit their business model. Reddit directly competes against that, as a news aggregator collects information from all sorts of places (including those hostile to Comcast).

Comcast could say, "Well, you're directly competing with our website, and you're putting hostile articles about us on the front page. We'll just throttle your access until your users get frustrated and leave." They're not the government; they can refuse service to whomever they please.

If the FCC doesn't create rules that enforce net neutrality, this is a reality. And what's more is that no one can stop them otherwise because many people have no alternative to Comcast. As the South Park episode goes, "Oh, you must be really bummed. I guess you could switch services... oh... wait, you can't. We're the only one."

(nipple rubbing intensifies)

Basically, if you have the resources, you can enforce dominance in the market with money. One of the cool things about Internet startups right now is that the barrier to entry is pretty low - anyone with a laptop, an Internet connection, and some pretty cheap web hosting service can create the next Facebook. The lack of net neutrality changes that.