You are not supposed to drink water off the tap (well, actually you can, if you don't value your kidneys in the long run), you are supposed to filter it through $40 device or boil it, then you can drink it. That's something that everyone does, I don't see this problem, like, at all. I dunno why restaurants charge for water, maybe because they can.

Most people here don't buy bottled water because they don't have a car and/or don't care about water quality and/or don't think bottled water is superior. People use filters to filter tap water or just boil it.

Serving tap water in restaurants doesn't sound right to me. First of all, pipes might be rusty.

So… bottled water is superior? I thought it's essentially filtered tap water…

It all depends on the quality of tap water - there are locations where tap water is pretty much the same as bottled water, and there are locations where tap water isn't considered drinkable unless boiled beforehand.

Bottled water quality is predictable, your next restaurant's plumbing condition is not.

I don't like branded bottled water but at least you know what you get.