If people don't want it, why does it succeed on social media, or anywhere at all?

Because we count success as someone clicked on the article at all as opposed to how they used it. People talk about the studies and A/B testing done to support the claims of rich media being all the rage, but how easy would it be for any of these studies to miss the forest for a tree?

that's like saying roads are successful because many people are driving on them.