> If that user doesn't exist and the user who values it the least values it at $100

In a competitive market, which is the case being talked about in what you responded to, that's impossible. If the production cost is $1, more users will keep buying the product until the marginal user values it at $1. If there are no users who value it between $100 and $1, then you don't have a competitive market; either the product or service is too specialized to permit real competition (which is highly implausible for the kinds of services we're talking about), or someone has their thumb on the scale.

> Not all of them are competitive.

The market not being competitive doesn't create any connection that isn't there in a competitive market. So it doesn't change what I said.

> They are party to it though. They didn't pay money, but they paid in attention

The transaction in which the users pay with attention is not the same as the transaction where the advertisers pay the tech company to get their ads shown. The latter transaction is the one I was talking about in what you responded to. The user is not a party to that transaction.

> you can be pretty effective with search advertising by basing the ads entirely on the search query while knowing nothing whatsoever about the user.

Yes, you do know something about the user: what search query they entered. True, it's not as much information about the user as they collect in other ways, but it's still information about the user. If I enter a search query for Depends, Google knows something about me that's of value to advertisers.

> The service doesn't have to end up underwater for something stupid to be happening

True, but irrelevant to what I was saying, or what you were saying that I responded to.