Ads enabling free online content is a bit of a glazier's fallacy. Yes, when ads are an option most content producers will be funded by ads. it's simple to implement and does not require end user consent but as soon as the degenerate strategy is removed new strategies become viable such as micro-payments.
I think the potential of micro-payments was never reached because transactions are currently too large, and uni-directional. If we could process payments of $0.01, it would create a culture were you are actually willing to pay for content. Also, if you make a insightful comment, a product review, or even a upvote, you should receive some credits to spend back on consuming content. Doesn't have to be blockchain, it would be effective even if limited to one site or content provider.
What we actually need in a practical sense is Kindle Unlimited but for web content.
And furthermore it could be a plurality of those kinds of providers aggregating content.
Deploy single-sign-on schemes, and websites might participate in a plurality of programs from different vendors.
But at the end of the day, you'd pay one or two "providers" a monthly sub, they pool the funds, take their cut, and do prorata distribution of the pool based on views, eyeball time, popularity of content, lots of ways.
No need to perform microtransactions from a banking perspective. You're going to eat $20 of web content this month, and so will lots of others. And then those views can participate in the pool and get paid monthly or something.
