$12 dollars is $12 dollars people wouldn't have without them. You can always opt out of a class action settlement and sue yourself if you're not happy with the terms.

But at the end of the day, the lawyers did real work, took on real risk and achieved something. They held a big tech company accountable, and that is a meaningful difference from the status quo. I don't care that they made money doing that, they should.

Is it really holding them "accountable" when the settlements are for laughably small amounts, like <1% of a single day's profit?

No one else is doing anything. So it's something.