> One common response to this is "well, maybe everyone should be hobbyists again making content for free," but surely we can find a better middleground than structuring things such that we depend on people toiling away in their freetime to produce the content we happen to want. For example, I'd rather my favorite content providers be able to feed themselves working on this content.

If you do it as a hobby, it's not toiling. It becomes toiling when you do it as work, especially if you have to please advertisers instead of making the content you love.