But ... it's not really free since the ad will just make products more expensive, since now you also pay for the adtech that's involved (besides paying with your personal data).
You can see this with the rise of ultra specialty online stores we’ve seen in the last decade thank to targeted advertising.
Yes, ads make people buy more stuff.
Is that a good thing? My comment doesn't say anything about that.
But anyway, my guess is no, because it leads to overconsumption, and exhaustion of natural resources.
Also:
> 96% of US users opted out of IDFA sharing
Meaning that users really do not want to be tracked.
> will just make products more expensive, since now you also pay for the adtech that's involved
That’s not generally how the economics of advertising works. If it were, advertising wouldn’t be very successful/important.
People don’t like the idea of being tracked, but my experience is that they like the results.. Especially all the extreme specialty niche products that simply wouldn’t exist without targeted ads.