The comment I replied (and the article itself) seem to imply that, if you monetize via advertising, that your business isn't really about whatever you say it is

The comment I replied (and the article itself) seem to imply that, if you monetize via advertising, that your business isn't really about whatever you say it is. I was replying that I fail to see how that's different from non-advertising-fueled businesses. For example, Facebook isn't really about connecting people, but a hypothetical competitor with the exact same feature set that charged a subscription fee instead of running ads would be about connecting people?