I agree with you completely; the balance indeed is among advertisers, the supply chain, and consumers.

I assert that balance, in this case, means all parties trying to optimize for their own best interests. This self-interested optimization, in turn, plays out in a give and take among all parties. The balance is maintained through checks and balances; the parties act as adversaries when necessary to prevent any individual party from gaining too much power or subverting the interests of another. Otherwise the system becomes unstable.