I also agree that VM are getting a bit sucky of late, I find their customer service ranges from appalling to excellent depending on what call centre you get (apparently random).
The Terms of Service changes are a bit naughty as is the Phorm business.. Sadly, I cannot get any service other than cable it seems.
I must admit though that compared to the ADSL line I had at our old house the VM service is rock solid (Scientific Atlanta Modem) and the speed always hits the 2MB service we are signed up to when bench marking.
If you don't want your ISP profiling what you do and limiting your usage, I've heard the Onion Router stuff is very effective, it basically anonymises what you do from what i hear..
http://www.torproject.org/
*edit - TOR does actually look like it uses MORE bandwidth on your connection though sadly *