Reputable AdTech firms is comparable to responsible tobacco firms, both are peddling unhealthy goods, both try to whitewash their image by claiming to be above the fray. Also, it's actually in a user's best interest to allow the data to be shared. Otherwise doctors will see ads about vaping and fishers will see ads about the latest JavaScript IDEs - no, just no. First of all I can only assume that doctors are more likely to read publications which are related to their profession and as such can be targeted for advertising there, just like fishermen will read publications related to fishing and as such can be targeted. Ads on Javascript IDEs belong in publications related to programming, ads about vaping belong in the dustbin or, if you insist, in lifestyle magazines and similar vacuous outlets. There is no need to follow those doctors around to pester them with ads related to their profession when they turn to the daily news, just like those fishermen don't need to be targeted when they happen to open an unrelated site. In short, there is no need for active profiling. Since AdTech insists on doing this anyway it is in users best interest to a) make sure there is as little data to be gathered by AdTech firms and b) to make sure they don't see any ad, period. You - as in the AdTech industry - made your bed, now lie in it.
> In short, there is no need for active profiling.
Active profiling is needed so that tobacco ads do not show up in your kids' newsfeed.
> b) to make sure they don't see any ad, period.
Nobody likes ads, but there are millions of businesses with ads being the only revenue source. No ads - no service. It's not because site owners want to show you ads, it's because they cannot sustain without not showing you these ads.
> Active profiling is needed so that tobacco ads do not show up in your kids' newsfeed.
Apart from the targeted ads there exist context-based ads (just like in the newspapers from your example). Show me a scientific proof that the former work better.
> Active profiling is needed so that tobacco ads do not show up in your kids' newsfeed.
Tobacco ads should only be in publications targeted at tobacco consumers, i.e. "Smokers Digest" or whatever. Yes, that limits their exposure. That is a feature, not a bug.
On the "no ads, no service" remark I know of plenty of useful sites - this one being one of them - which get their funding from different sources. For some - me being one of them - this probably goes for the majority of sites they frequent, others might fare differently. The thing is, it is not just the fact that there are ads which turn people to ad blockers, it is the fact that there are those AdTech companies doing their best to syphon up their data so as to badger them with ads wherever they go. Had ads been like they were in magazines, i.e. anonymous and related to the subject matter, there would have been far less incentive to block them. That bird has flown a long time ago though, something for which AdTech is partly responsible next to the fact that ad servers have been used to spread malware and that the ads themselves went from simple banners to screen-dominating blinking screeching monstrosities.
