If advertising is no longer financially rewarding, is there not an argument that labor could transition into a different sector of the economy?

Companies based around advertising would die, yes, but they only exist in the first place because of how lucrative the activity is. Nobody is sitting around dreaming of how they could sell ads better than anyone else while not thinking of the financial compensation. At least I hope they aren't.

If someone was saying "many people have jobs in running offshore internet sports betting companies, if we put regulations on offshore internet sports betting, it would remove jobs" wouldn't the natural question be whether those industries are actually productive to have people employed in, or if it's a harmful industry overall? Generally in my view its somewhat sad that the system as a whole optimizes for advertising work rather than orienting in a way that everyone could be putting their work towards something they see as more fulfilling.

There is certainly more need for product discoverability broadly than something like online gambling, but I think the more relevant conversation is if the current advertising model is more like a local minima preventing progress towards a more economically viable method of handling product discoverability.

"We can't get rid of this toxic part of society because what if people lose jobs?" has never really been a great argument. Like, maybe society could find a way to financially support people who transition to a new career (although if you've made any sort of money from ads, I'd argue that uh... you should've saved more, but whatever. Labor rights, etc.). "We ban something and then you're just out of a job" doesn't have to be what happens, it's just what typically happens. We can get creative, though! Other modes of governing society are entirely possible. We can both support people and keep them happy and healthy, while also getting rid of things like advertising. We just need to imagine a better world.

> the economy would contort into something unrecognizable.

You say it as if it was a self evident negative, but isnt that the goal of people who want to ban ads? To dramatically change the economy?

With GenAI, I suspect a lot that could be ad-supported will evaporate anyway.

How can you get a reputation for a high-quality well-researched podcast(/youtube channel) when your voice(/face) can be cloned by the advertiser who buys a slot somewhere in your podcast(/video) to sell some snakeoil?

Are those your friends you're seeing on social media enjoying ${brand} or supporting ${politician}? Or did your friends all leave the site years ago, and these are just fakes, legally licenced by the advertisers from the social media firm thanks to a clause in the TOS that's hard for non-lawyers to comprehend the consequences of?

The best digital services I use are without exception ones I pay for with money.

The services I pay for with attention are without exception ones I have a love/hate relationship with, which maybe fulfill some occasional need but just as often I return to out of addictive pattern. It's not hard to imagine better ways to fulfill those needs which are simply not viable as businesses because of the competition from attention-paid services.

You're saying that like it was a bad thing...