It baffles me that pundits, researchers, political leaders and such ponder what’s going wrong when they walk to work and see every single human being doomscrolling this trash away, all while the companies hosting it become the richest on Earth.

One of those is not like the others. As long as lobbying and kickbacks are legal or no worse than a slap on the wrist, politicians are more than happy to be paid to not wonder or care why. Heck, some of them probably welcome it—the algorithms helped them get elected.