What I find most distressing about all the debate re ad-blocking is the built-in assumption that advertising is the only way we could possibly fund content creation on the web: that it all just comes down to compromising on what the &quot;acceptable&quot; level of advertising is.<p>I don&#x27;t accept that premise.  The debate should be framed as &quot;Adverting: is it good or bad?&quot; but somehow we let it slide into &quot;Advertising: should it be extremely obnoxious or slightly less obnoxious?&quot;<p>Advertising changed the web, it made it worse in most ways -- it encourages a constant stream of low-value content that serves as a framing device for banner slots.  If advertising magically disappeared one day, I think nearly all kinds of website would be able to find a revenue model that works (in most cases it would boil down to &quot;make less content, of higher value, that people would actually be willing to pay for.&quot;)<p>The only types of sites that literally could not survive without an advertising-based revenue model are the clickbait listicle aggregators of other peoples&#x27; content. Which, yeah, I&#x27;m kind of okay with.  People would still find their way to their memes and cat videos, they&#x27;d just do it on a hobbyist level.  Ultimately we&#x27;d all, publishers and end users alike, be better off without ads.