[eevilspock]

How you monetize[1] has a lot to do with good and evil. Certainly the web has costs, but the honest and pro-free market thing to do is transparently make users pay those costs, not dishonestly tell them something is free and when in fact you are making them pay all the costs and much more[2].

Free markets only work in so far as consumers make informed purchase decisions, weighing benefits against costs. Advertising obfuscates and increases costs in the most insidious way.

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[1] Does a baker speak of "monetizing" bread? No, because a baker uses a straightforward and honest business model: Make bread that people need or desire, price it right, and they will buy it. Yes, the baker is technically monetizing bread, water and yeast, but to actively think in those terms puts one into the mindset of "How do I unload this bread, water and yeast onto people and somehow get them to pay me?" which in turn makes it easy to slip on the addendum, "get them to pay me no matter the means."

[2] https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=7485773