Money. Why is Netflix offering an ad-supported product when people pay for it? Because it turns out they make more money from advertisers per person than from

Money. Why is Netflix offering an ad-supported product when people pay for it? Because it turns out they make more money from advertisers per person than from charging directly. There’s no such thing as a free internet because everything connected to it costs money: the electricity, the equipment, the wires, the software for routing, the maintenance. And for a real short time we had a system where everyone paid for their own part and occasionally there’d be something so popular that the server would fall apart. Someone’s university IT would knock on the door and say “what on earth are you doing?” The only way we get to a free internet is to: a) fix global economics b) start a new one and don’t let the capitalists in* *mostly a joke