I'd argue that the issue is the fundamentally incompatible model of news and competition. We didn't know this before the internet, but now that we can actually

I'd argue that the issue is the fundamentally incompatible model of news and competition. We didn't know this before the internet, but now that we can actually measure engagement for crazy content vs real content, I'll make the argument. In essence, FB/Twit have the same issue as old school cable networks. Markets drive competition which drives optimization. In the case of news and media, the optimization force is engagement. The market rewards engagement over "truth". People will rather watch sports or reality TV than watch boring news. You can see it in media studies of headlines, and we now have empirical data on submissions to reddit and engagement being related to sentiment/modification of headlines. So news talks about the most sensational content it can find (Man bites dog). As sensational news gets boring, you get more "breaking news" to cut through the ennui. I hope its not too much of a stretch to argue that barring any upper limit, this system will optimize itself to self mockery. At least I don't see how publicly owned firms can afford to optimize differently.