The answer of course is somewhere in between depending on context. People don't have zero agency, but they also don't have 100% agency.
If you are looking for a camera, going to a review site will give you a fair chance to find the product that fits your needs (most likely a lens module for your phone). Looking at Canon ads is not that.
A short version of this would be any product information media output that doesn't detail a products principle flaws is manipulation intended to sidestep your agency.
When did you last see a fizzy drinks (pop, soda) advert that said "tap water is better for you and cheaper but our brand advertising is supposed to associate drinking our drinks with being cool, so choose to avail yourself of our continued widescale brainwashing of your society to help you feel socially superior" or "we make sure our batteries mtbf is 2.5 years, with a narrow sd so that it needs replacing just after the warranty period expires; the battery though, it's glued in - clever eh!".
The central tenet of market capitalisms optimisation relies on consumers having perfect information and operating on that information. Advertising, the ads I've ever seen, are a direct effort at circumvention of that.
Yes, people still have some agency, otherwise ads wouldn't be needed. But ads purpose is to erode that agency.
Your post sounds like the attempted justification of someone who uses advertising?