When I mention a "social function", I don't mean a "public service". I mean in the utilitarian sense. Every economic activity has a social function. If you consider yourself to be living in a free society, for every kind of activity you do you are expected to provide some kind of good or service that is of interest of others. If it is considered to be beneficial only to one of the parties, it is not going to happen (unless it is done by force, but then we don't have an actual free society)
From brick layers to gas stations, from restaurant chefs to prostitutes, from Venture Capital Fund Managers to shoe makers to Hollywood. That is the case even to advertising. Advertising's "social function" is to inform the consumer public about what is available in the market at large, and to give to producers a chance to showcase their offerings. This may sound "idealistic", but it shouldn't be.
You seem to be focused on the "business" part of the things. As in "how to make money to keep that activity?" For society, this doesn't matter. If there is any other way to fulfill that need, the business is obsolete and can (should) go extinct or adapt into something else.
You have the arrows reversed: you want society to accept that the business needs to exist, and that it should change to support it. In fact, it is the business that needs to change to always support the needs of society.
Yours is the corporatist view. This view is what brings us the continued influence of RIAA and MPAA and DRM. It's what brings us poor-quality American cars. It is what brings "Food, Inc" thanks to subsidies in the corn industry. It is what brings us a society that is so drowned in "cheap" entertainment that leads to this dystopia we live in (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Amusing_Ourselves_to_Death)
> Destroy brands? Why? What's that do?
I don't say in the sense of setting corporate places on fire. I mean in the sense of being able to convince people that most of the time, there is a "brand-free" version of a product that is of equal or superior quality but that costs less.
Think of things like consumer electronics: most of the audio equipment or LCD panels can be virtually the same, yet people are so bombarded by ads from the "reputable brands", they can't even conceive or looking for an OEM factory.
Another example: at least in São Paulo I remember going to the mall and seeing "designer" jeans that would cost $100. Those jeans were produced in many different small shops around the city, spec'd by the "designer". The uncle of a friend of mine ran one of those shops. He would sell the "unbranded" version of the jeans for $15.
Another example: Go to any supermarkets, and you find "white label" products that are sometimes produced by companies that produce the very same "branded" version. The contents can be the same, yet the branded one will cost more.
What is the benefit of "brands" in these examples? How are the advertising companies helping people in making better informed decisions?
You also seem to have some idealistic idea of what advertising is. It's not some efficient marketplace to connect people. It is an industry about attention. And no it's not "stealing" as everything in the world competes for attention. It's more of paying to capture that attention as best it can. There is no greater "social function" here.
Society benefits from all things. Again YOU cannot judge this based on some random questions about Wikipedia vs some entertainment publication. The careers of those mentioned in that publication and their livelihoods and families certainly benefit from it so it's all relative and there's no right or ideal.
There might be misaligned incentives for some publishers choosing to maximize revenue (that's not the bad thing since they are businesses) by focusing on improving ad load rather than content. That doesn't mean there's something wrong with advertising, only that that business has become focused on selling ads rather than producing content.
The whole last part of your statement makes no sense to me. Destroy brands? Why? What's that do? Do you know what brands are? They are just reputations, but at a higher level for corporations and product lines. You should read this: http://www.economist.com/news/business/21614150-brands-are-m...
Attention can absolutely be extracted, it doesn't have to "belong" to someone because it's an abstract thing in itself. There is no "attention" tangible good. You have as much of it as you want. It's just a way to think of the value exchange. I'm not sure what you're so confused about but calling others immoral certainly isn't the way to prove your point.