TV news and national newspapers should be at the top of the attention economy because they have the highest production value, ostensibly the most resources, and theoretically the widest reach. And if that were all true, these outlets should have no problem competing with, say, random teenagers on TikTok using a text-to-speech function and random photos they found on Twitter to incorrectly explain what vinyl chloride does when you burn it. But news outlets can’t churn out content that fast because even the most well-funded state-of-the-art newsrooms in the world — which none of these are anymore thanks to absolutely gutted advertising markets — can still only operate as fast as it takes human beings and institutions to respond (if they actually want to report out a complete story). And, so, a whole lot of people, especially young people who weren’t around for the chaotic move 15 years ago from a television-led media environment to a deeply flawed digital one — find it very easy to assume there’s some kind of large-scale conspiracy to not cover the literal mushroom cloud of toxic gas hovering over the midwest right now. Because what else could explain why CNN isn’t faster, better, and more interesting than TikTok?