The "so they could serve ads" meme is facile, reductionist, sophomoric. Actually, the fact that Google et al. were able to identify a profit function that could be optimized to fund the last 15 years of technology is an incredible achievement. In ~2000 it wasn't at all obvious that the internet could find a robust funding model.
Where the funding comes from is practically irrelevant, specially if it is a feedback function (i.e., an economic phenomenon, not "phone the legislature to fund more research!!1").
New funding models are good, too, of course. But the tone of the anti-ad camp is asinine.
