[Nextgrid]

This raises a question, how much does the cancer that is advertising & analytics consumes in terms of electricity and engineering time that could've been put to better use?

[ndnxhs]

Computers use next to nothing in total. Almost all energy is used on heating/cooling, transport and farming.

[Nextgrid]

It still means we're wasting energy cooling computers that are used for advertising & stalking. Those computers can be put to better use instead.

[ndnxhs]

The bigger problem is advertising drives needless and wasteful consumption.

[savanaly]

It certainly accompanies it (can you imagine a world where there was needless and wasteful consumption, but no one bothered to advertise?). I wouldn't be so sure about causation.

[TeMPOraL]

If you can't imagine a world with wasteful consumption but no advertising, that kind of tentatively rules out "wasteful consumption causes advertising". What remains is "advertising causes wasteful consumption" and "wasteful consumption and advertising are both caused by a third thing", but given that advertising is literally the art and science of making people buy more stuff, the "advertising causes wasteful consumption" option seems the most probable.