> Meanwhile, our experience of the internet is increasingly controlled by a handful of firms, most especially Google and Facebook. The argument for regulating these companies as public utilities is arguably at least as strong as the argument for thus regulating ISPs
The difference is that the markets are entirely different. It's possible to have a Facebook-like system with no Facebook-like entity in control of it, the canonical examples being email or the web. It's not a natural monopoly.
It isn't even a real monopoly at all. There is Twitter, Tumblr, the Google thing(s), the Microsoft thing(s), actual unaffiliated web pages, email, etc. Most people use Facebook and Twitter. Basically nobody uses Comcast and Charter.
There is a fair argument that we should adopt policies to bolster open systems like web/email over closed systems like Facebook so there is more vigorous competition. But the idea that we should enshrine Facebook as a permanent monopoly and then have the government regulate its content is the complete opposite of that. It's ludicrous.
And that isn't what network neutrality is anyway. Network neutrality doesn't regulate content. It says nothing about what anyone can print, it just says that everyone can buy ink on the same terms.