Defending this practice because it's the status quo is ludicrous.
All of these things happen not because people approve of them, but because they have no choice. Every company in those industries is doing this because they want more profits. Companies do have the choice, but they would flood your eyeballs with ads 24/7 if it was socially acceptable. So they push that line as far as they can take it before people start complaining. And that's how we got to where we are now.
The thing most people don't consciously think about is that advertising is brainwashing and psychological manipulation. It's designed to embed products and ideas into your psyche to get you to do something or think a certain way. Separating me from my money is extortion, though fairly benign. What I find truly insidious is putting thoughts into my head. Political ads and propaganda are weapons of war since they manipulate how societies think and behave. They have the ability to influence how people vote, to topple governments, to cause civil unrest and deep distrust in societies. How most of the world isn't seeing the sociopolitical instability we've been seeing in the past decade as a direct consequence of ad-fueled social manipulation is beyond me.
To speak nothing of the multi-billion dark industry of data brokers, and companies hoovering up and profiting off of our data in perpetuity.
Advertising is evil to its core and is the most harmful yet normalized industry we've ever invented.
That is indeed what I do when I see a subscription pop-up or some other annoyance my adblocker missed. Despite, by that time I've already clicked on it, and sometimes even read some of the content, before I'm rudely ejected from the experience. This is simply not pleasant and doesn't help anyone.
Websites that do not use ads cannot survive (on a large scale) if their competition uses ads.
Large consumer-facing websites are forced to use ads.
As long as ads are legal, consumers will not have the choice to use ad-free websites. (The only exceptions being startups operating at a loss.)
This is not even solved by websites allowing for paid, ad-free plans.
Who pays for Google? You, when you by a can of Coke. Coca Cola increases the price of the drink, then gives that extra money to Google.
If you are using a paid, ad-free plan, you are not only paying for the plan, you are also still paying the increased price of Coca Cola.
As long as ads are legal, people who use paid plans have to pay more* than twice of what the service is actually worth.
*Don't forget the effort that is being put into designing ads, building tracking technology, managing tracking data centers, which again, are paid by you, every time you buy anything.
All of these things happen not because people approve of them, but because they have no choice. Every company in those industries is doing this because they want more profits. Companies do have the choice, but they would flood your eyeballs with ads 24/7 if it was socially acceptable. So they push that line as far as they can take it before people start complaining. And that's how we got to where we are now.
The thing most people don't consciously think about is that advertising is brainwashing and psychological manipulation. It's designed to embed products and ideas into your psyche to get you to do something or think a certain way. Separating me from my money is extortion, though fairly benign. What I find truly insidious is putting thoughts into my head. Political ads and propaganda are weapons of war since they manipulate how societies think and behave. They have the ability to influence how people vote, to topple governments, to cause civil unrest and deep distrust in societies. How most of the world isn't seeing the sociopolitical instability we've been seeing in the past decade as a direct consequence of ad-fueled social manipulation is beyond me.
To speak nothing of the multi-billion dark industry of data brokers, and companies hoovering up and profiting off of our data in perpetuity.
Advertising is evil to its core and is the most harmful yet normalized industry we've ever invented.