Netflix is not a good counter argument, since lots of that content is not (legally/easily for casual users) available anywhere else even with ads.
YouTube premium might be a better counterargument—but I’m not sure how many people are buying it just for ad removal versus buying it to get access to additional games/movies/content. Is that data available? I’d be interested in checking it out if so!
Certainly I don’t have adverts when I check my email, does Hotmail etc do adverts now? I’m sure they didn’t back in the early 00s.