I'll grant that monetizing advertising without scale may be futile. However, the flip side of this is that monetizing too late shapes a company into a VC addict

I'll grant that monetizing advertising without scale may be futile. However, the flip side of this is that monetizing too late shapes a company into a VC addict, always pushing the fund raising lever for another scale pellet. Few media sites make it at all, hoping they can scale their way to viability. At a certain point, entrepreneurs need to tell VC's to get out of the way with their the-first-hit-is-free scale advice.