My personal view is that most ads drive materialism and fulfillment through consumption which is evil. We also have research correlating familiarity and trust, so ads are there to brainwash you into trusting brands you have no reason to trust. If the ad business was boiled down to ads that were good for society it would be so small there’d be little conversation about it. The dark side of the ad business is what keeps everyone in it, the abusive user tracking is just the newest horrible dimension of it.

> People want ads

Says who? Sounds like rationalization from someone who works in the industry. I could be wrong.