You've really hit on something there: The underlying lack of understanding by many consumers. Of course, throttling refers to
intentional slowing of an Internet service to implement a QoS policy, not the
natural slowing of an Internet service due to the service reaching its capacity. However, as you said, consumers would mistakenly presume that it is something that their service provider is
"doing to them" that should not be
"done to them" rather than just a normal, to-be-expected reflection of maxing out a shared resource, in the context of the terms and conditions that express mass-market Internet service performance in terms such as "
Actual speeds vary and are not guaranteed."