i think the main problem there is that cookies are so intractibly tied up with tracking, any attempt to create better cookies now will get shut down by privacy advocates who simply don't want the whole concept to exist.

we're stuck with cookies because they exist.

Every privacy advocate I know hands over exquisitely detailed private and personal information to Google and/or Apple. It seems unfair to generalize as “privacy advocates” so much as it is people who are anti-ads.

Being anti-ads is a valid opinion. It has less intellectual cover than pro “privacy” though.