That's what is at jeopardy here and nobody is willing to just say it.
Don't agree with the concept of tracking users to serve them ads? Great, make the case that GDPR ends the scourge of advertising subsidized applications as services.
Let's not ignore it though. The reality is, a lot of internet companies that consumers use and like, rely on either selling advertisers access to their market or sell user contact data outright, because there is no other way to make money.
If the argument is that this is an unethical and harmful way to keep services alive then we need to agree that the bulk of the last 20 years of startups business models are broken and what the implications for future internet business models are.
I agree.
If a startup is build on selling my data, I am more willing to pay a fee then to have them sell my data.
If we could go back to WhatsApp having a fee instead of Facebook using and selling my (meta)data, I would switch anytime. If Telegram starts raising a fee for using their messenger without anybody reading my messenges/location/... I am all in.