Less business were able to. Personalized ads makes it so that more businesses are viable.
As consumers start understanding exactly how adtech works - and such education took decades - they are freely choosing devices that limit tracking, and when given the option to opt-out, are opting out at extremely high numbers. This tells you something about what consumers want.
Businesses would be more viable if they learned to market through mechanisms that were less distasteful to consumers.
I can assure you that consumers do not. Even someone in this comment section of a technical form didn't know what attribution is which is an important part of how adtech works. Even from an extremely high level the prevalence of the phrase "XYZ is selling your data" despite that not happening is a clear sign that most people just parrot what they hear than actually understand. There has been a large amount of scaremongering about how bad this tracking is to people. This scaremongering drives more people to opt out than people opting out who actually understand how it works.
>Businesses would be more viable if they learned to market through mechanisms that were less distasteful to consumers.
That is not true. If the cost of that alternative marketing costs more than what you will make from doing it then the business is not viable.
What are they? Android is copying Apple[0]. Desktop?
[0] - https://www.cnbc.com/2022/02/16/google-plans-android-privacy...
It's tough for businesses that thrived on the privacy-compromising features of early 21st century adtech. They can adapt or die.