[2THFairy]

> They definitely were a thing all the way back to the first browsers.

I am not disputing that ads were a thing. I am not disputing that ads were common.

I said that there were a lot of sites that chose not to run them.

> They all wish they had the viewership for ads.

This is just not true. Like, c'mon man, the very site you're on right now takes this approach.

[tracker1]

I had ads on one of my sites in the later 90's that drew a fair amount of traffic... it technically was enough to pay for the hosting, but in the end it wasn't making enough money for it to be real income. I removed it just because I wanted to give a better experience.