Another second-order benefit is the fact that innovation in ad tech has bled over into other kinds of content recommendation. If you can figure out which ads I

Another second-order benefit is the fact that innovation in ad tech has bled over into other kinds of content recommendation. If you can figure out which ads I would likely click on, you can also probably figure out what news stories I’m interested in. That being said, while ads may improve certain kinds of content, it is strictly negative for other kinds. For example, pretty much every kind of ad online which is intrusive. It’s intrusive because it’s not wanted. I don’t want a full screen Dior ad in the middle of an article about the auto worker strike. So sometimes the interests of advertisers and users are aligned, but many times they are not. And ad tech companies know which kinds of content are improved with ads and which damage the user experience. They could measure this if they wanted. But because they are trying to maximize ad revenue rather than user experience, so the ads win.