Honestly I do waffle between these two views of it. That they do work and so we should avoid them or they don't work and the entire internet is a bubble built o

Honestly I do waffle between these two views of it. That they do work and so we should avoid them or they don't work and the entire internet is a bubble built on top of a fake idea and so we should avoid them. I don't see how both can be true and I find both equally compelling, with comparable explanatory power of different things I see. But for the specific purpose of deciphering the actions and motivations of ad companies I think assuming they work is a more useful view. Presumably ad companies are acting as if ads work, and are assuming they work equally well on people running ad blockers, if they can get them past the ad blockers. I find them corrosive to my soul and culture either way, and ad companies are acting towards me as if they work. So in this context I think it makes sense to also act as if they do.