> we can't just have an entire world of sites and services all available for free with just a few ads slapped on top of them Arguably, advertising on the Web i

> we can't just have an entire world of sites and services all available for free with just a few ads slapped on top of them Arguably, advertising on the Web is too cheap and too ubiquitous. This may be even the key problem. As a reminder, before this, a select, smaller number of media like newspapers, magazines, even TV, was able to sustain itself by advertising with consumer prices only contributing to a minor part of the overall costs of production and distribution. (The peak in revenues from this actually isn't that long ago: 2008/2009.) The current model of ubiquitous, but also infinitesimal small prices & revenues, plays only to the brokers, while sustaining nothing.