I haven't seen it happen with novels (yet), but I was a little outraged to buy a weekly planner that featured mindfulness exercises and such to focus on each week…and find it laden with advertisements for the author's website, companion videos, etc.
I have no interest in using the internet for that; I bought a dead tree specifically to avoid my computer for a minute.
Just because they uses old examples doesn't invalidate their point, although yes, following the rise of Gacha games in Japan and Asian markets essentially a lot of games today key in some gacha like elements.
Most of the pages on the internet I visit is non-grifty, non-explitative type. Start from something like hackaday.com, and then subscribe to RSS feeds of the small websites you like.
(Of course adblocker is a must... But living without adblocker on today's web is like walking barefoot in NY)
I'd be more interested if the author gave clear examples of where this works in today's internet, because saying you are part of the Geocities or Neopets forums side of the internet is like the old man yelling on his lawn lamenting how much better things were when he was young.