New Delhi, July 20 -- Last month, Amazon Prime Video introduced ads to its subscription tier in India. You can still go ad-free, it'll just cost an additional Rs.129 per month on top of the existing Rs.299 monthly plan. Naturally, a section of the internet wasn't thrilled.

Every time there's a furore around ads interrupting our content experience, I can't help but think of a set of people for whom this is just another day at work. Media planners, marketing consultants and ad strategists have to sit through ads not because they can't afford to go ad-free, but because it's part of the job.

Their work requires constant monitoring of ads across platforms. Exposure becomes essential market research, almost like an audit, some of them tell me...