This is true, but I posit that those businesses can easily move to a pay model. If they can't, they aren't legitimate businesses.

> It is an argument that THIS model is failing when it once worked, so we need a new model to pay for the things we do value online.

"Worked" is not what I would say about the current state of ads on the internet. It certainly doesn't work for me.

> And if this model fails and no other emerges, then either people work for free, whatever terminology you want to use for that,

Volunteering? Play? Definitely not slavery. If you don't want to labor for free, just don't do it. This isn't a complicated situation, you're smart enough to figure this out.

> or things we value simply disappear, something I have already seen more than enough of over the years -- and compared to many here, I got online relatively recently.

Well, I was on the internet in the 90s, and there was some great content back then. I'll actually posit that the signal-to-noise ratio was much higher then.

Also, funded content disappears all the time. If that's the effect you're concerned about, this isn't the cause you're looking for.