I tend to think that the idea of surveillance driven advertising as a model is itself an excuse or justification for intrusion and eradication of personal privacy. I'm saying the whole of that industry was all about spying from the beginning, subsidised by the governance structure, and that the idea that there is actually much of an industry there at all, is am excuse to provide plausible deniability. I don't think online advertising works at anything like the scales we are told.
Look into how much money there actually is in surveillance driven advertising. It's more than you'd imagine.
A good place to start is social media companies' revenue per user. A few years ago Facebook's was about $40/month/user globally, which means users would have to pay $40/month to outbid advertisers.
It's definitely financially motivated. Governments surely piggyback on it and encourage it, but the main driver was and is money.
I'm sure it's about money, I don't think it's based on the market though.
I reckon it's based in indirect governance structure subsidies being sent to those companies that have been set up to harvest data.
The reason I think this, is I don't think I invest any of my resources according to what adverts are shown on a screen. Also, I don't think I know anyone that does spend according to advertising.
I realise companies' 'advertising spend' may also includes brand awareness and other non-sale elements... But you'd think that sometimes the spend would result in an actual sale to justify the spend.
