We manage the disconnection of domestic utilities, such as water or electricity, through metering. But metering is neither obvious nor easy. Thomas Edison's dazzling electrical gizmos were of little use to anyone until people had easy access to electricity in their factories and homes. So at the peak of his career Edison diverted his attention away from designing electrical devices to focus on the electrical delivery network itself.
Readers pay the same for a newspaper no matter how much of it they read.
Ditto for cable TV, books and computer software. All are priced flat for all you can use. But mostly Edison was stymied about how to meter electricity. For the first six months of his General Electric Lighting Company in New York City, customers paid a flat fee. To Edison's chagrin, that didn't work out economically.