That is wrong on both accounts. I have little choice other than to watch ads since the structure of incentive that creates a marketplace like YouTube forces it on me.

I think about libraries and how the world would be if instead of a free public resource, you had to watch ads before you were allowed to take out a book.

It is just the case that in this modern social media world, if you want your ideas to spread you have to put them onto social media. And if I want access to those ideas I have to consume them through social media. There is nothing about that environment that is my choice, it is the environment that I find myself in.

And I have few choices to get around it. I can twist up into a pretzel trying to block the onslaught with more "why don't you just..." advice. Or I could pay to make it go away. Or I could just go off-grid and forego access.

And when you look close at the options, it becomes clear that sovereignty of my own mind has a price. Freedom of mind is not free in this modern world, if it ever really was.

They wanted a whinge, and not a solution. A position that I truly do not understand, but is not uncommon.