Its worth remembering that the EU didn't mandate those pop-ups, they just said websites shouldn't collect data without permission. They were hoping to stop cookies altogether and eliminate data collection.

Instead scummy websites (seemingly every website!) throw up the pop-up asking your permission to perform scummy data collection but simultaneously make it difficult to click 'no'.

In an ideal world they would have blocked all data collection altogether. Magazine and roadside adverts are effective because they aim for a broad audience or those of a niche. If I'm reading Wired it is likely I will also be interested in tech company ads. Web ads can be the same without being hyper-personalised.

The EU were trying to resucitate an internet that had already been mortally wounded by targetted advertising.