I'd say you overestimate the number of people working on ad-supported software. Many, if not most of us are working on for-pay software and services.
The reason I'm ambivalent about ads is not because it funds my paycheck (it doesn't, we charge for our services), but because for all their evils, ads work as a kind of enforced redistribution mechanism, and since geographic adjustments of prices work poorly on the web, I fear that any kind of payment system will inevitably lead to prices being set at the US middle class income level, shutting out everyone with a lower income level.
I know can afford to pay for stuff, and I'm happy to do it, but that's only been true since I started working, and only because I'm lucky enough to have a decent job.
I suppose "we'll figure it out" is one answer, but I'm afraid I can't put my heart behind a proposal that would have left my teenager self closed off from most of the web.
Imagine a world, pre-internet, where almost all books are handed out free, but with their pages loaded with ads, and their stories embedded with "native" ads and product placements. Imagine that book "stores" get a cut of the ad revenue and so are incented to stock and push whatever book titles "clicked" the most and contained the most ads?
Authors in this world would say they have no choice, because readers will always choose the free book over the $10 or even $5 book. The bookstores only stock the free books for the same reason.
In that world you would make exactly the same argument that you just made to me.
I'm glad you work on non ad-supported software. But look at it from a consumption, share of revenue and availability perspective: ad supported software is eating the web.
And in that world, I would have been able to read a lot of books that I wish I could have when I was growing up, when I only got 3-4 books per year, plus access to a poorly stocked library.
Would I have traded? Yes, I probably would have.
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I also don't agree that one must oppose all advertising or none; we can oppose native ads and personal tracking without being necessarily opposed to well demarcated side ads.
The reason I'm ambivalent about ads is not because it funds my paycheck (it doesn't, we charge for our services), but because for all their evils, ads work as a kind of enforced redistribution mechanism, and since geographic adjustments of prices work poorly on the web, I fear that any kind of payment system will inevitably lead to prices being set at the US middle class income level, shutting out everyone with a lower income level.
I know can afford to pay for stuff, and I'm happy to do it, but that's only been true since I started working, and only because I'm lucky enough to have a decent job.
I suppose "we'll figure it out" is one answer, but I'm afraid I can't put my heart behind a proposal that would have left my teenager self closed off from most of the web.