My question should have been phrased "if someone hacks me from a broadband provider, would it be possible to report that person to his provider, or would that be a waste of time because they don't have acceptable-use policies?"

I have a couple of friends that have @home connections, and they have experienced severe slowdowns like the one you're describing...from what I've read, it's a fairly common problem with the cable modem architecture and how it shares bandwidth.

If I was gonna do broadband at my house, I'd do DSL - about the same price where I live, and I've heard better things about it.

I only used the word "pansy" because I anticipated that's how it would be seen by some of the "more-aggressive" members here