Then all you have to do in order to see it through the other lens is to think content when you see link in this context. We know that the platforms don't do linking as in <a href=...>Click here</a>. They all embed titles, summaries, pictures and sometimes whole pages. I think the conversation about linking in this context is a straw man. It's not about linking. Then overlay how profits are generated around it. The analogies fall apart and the problem emerges. In the end it comes down to profit or wealth redistribution and priorities. For a while money has been flowing away from news and into platforms. We need to shift money back from platforms to news. If the platforms paid reasonable taxes, maybe we could redistribute it from there to the news. Except platforms don't pay reasonable taxes. In this case it's either coming out of citizens pockets, a new net subtraction, or it's gotta come from the platforms' pockets. We seem to have made the right choice to take it out of the platforms. We're going about doing that.

Mind you, the conversation about the accessibility of quality news content across the classes of society is distinctly separate from this and worth having. Depending on how much we are able to get from the platforms back into the news, we may be able to decrease the cost of access for everyone. If you're concerned about that, you should be rooting for higher numbers rather than lower.