[joe_the_user]

It seems like an abuse of the concept of "degree of surprise".

An article produced by a totalitarian state could contain a lot of "surprising information", in an information theoretic sense - if it described surprising wardrobe choices and surprising choices of meals by the fearless leader. Vacuous tabloids describe the surprising antics of the more mentally unbalanced celebrities but also don't challenge our world view. And made-up stuff like QAnon is partly surprise driven.

Also, the biggest hit to conventional media has been craigslist - print media never was primarily funded by subscriptions but always made most of it's money with advertising.