The ad industry is a quagmire of fraud. Assuming someone got value out of money spent is tenuous.

It isn't that simple. Each company paying for ads would have preferred that their competitors had not advertised, then spend a lot less on ads... for the same value.

It is like an arms race. Everyone would have been better off if people just never went to war, but....

That someone might be Google, though. Not all ad dollars are well spent.

Ads are a cancer on humanity with no benefit to anyone and everyone who enables them should be imprisoned for life