The courts already distinguish "commercial speech" as a class of speech. Would we prevent all forms of commercial speech? What about a waiter asking you "would you like to try a rosé with that dish? It pairs very well together." Is that "advertising" that would need to be outlawed?
What about giving out free samples? Is that advertising, and thus should be illegal?
What about putting a sign up on your business that says the business name? Is that advertising?
I hate advertising and propaganda. But the hard part IMO is drawing the line. Where's the line?
The line is clear: is money being exchanged in order to promote a product? That's advertising.
Someone I know mentioning a product because they want to recommend it to me? Not advertising.
Giving out "free" samples? Presumably someone is being paid to do that, so advertising.
We can later quibble about edge cases and how to handle someone putting up a sign for their business. Many countries have regulations about visual noise, so that should be considered as well.
But it's pretty easy to distinguish advertising that seeks to manipulate, and putting a stop to that. Hell, we could start by surfacing the dark data broker market and banning it altogether. That alone should remove the most egregious cases of privacy abuse.
Let's say I have a journal. It costs money to subscribe. It covers a topic that many college students also study.
Can I give the school a free copy? Can I give the teachers one? Can I give the students one? Is this advertising? When does the amount of "value" become offensive?
> surfacing the dark data broker market and banning it altogether.
This is why this has become a modern problem. I can live with erring on the side of free speech when it comes to advertising, but there is no side to err on when it comes to analytics and targeting.
It's fine if everyone here wants to fantasize about some alternative system, but "we make advertising illegal" is not something that can happen in our system of governance.
I mean, no, legislatures (both Congress and the states) successfully limit commercial speech all the time, which is, for instance, why no one in Gen X has seen or heard a TV or radio ad for cigarettes in the US when they were old enough to purchase them.
> but "we make advertising illegal" is not something that can happen in our system of governance.
Broadly banning "advertising" (under almost any plausible definition that would be reasonably accord with common use) would probably fall afoul off the 1st Amendment as it is today, but our Constitutional system of government includes provision for changing any feature of the Constitution (nominally, except the equal representation of states in the Senate, but that restriction neither protects itself from being amended out, nor protects all the functions of the Senate from being amended out and the equal representation being at zero seats per state, so it is more of a symbolical than substantive restriction.)