Polymatter recently had a great video on the way the college ranking system is a hustle for foreign student money, and just how heavily it distorts colleges incentives: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cQWlnTyOSig
IMHO the onus to establish an assertion (as a general term) is on the person making it:
1. Imagine I post an assertion, 'the moon is made of blue cheese', and it's read by 20 people. Should all 20 do the research themselves? That's much less efficient than my doing it - I already know where I got it, it's my claim, and it's 1/20th the labor.
2. Think of all the assertions you read: Do you have time to research them all?
3. The Internet is filled with information, mostly BS. I don't have time for even a fraction of the accurate info. If we had 1% of the info, but it was backed by credible research, it would be no loss in info (nobody can process even 1%) and great gain.
Finally, people can't judge content it unless they have expertise in the domain. There is plenty of research showing that to be true - that fact is fundamental to misinformation and disinformation, even something as simple as paid Amazon reviews - and it's easy to observe. Think of something in which you have expertise, like your profession: Could you persuade a non-expert? I could persuade one of almost anything, it seems; they just have no idea what are the questions, the facts (beyond a very limited range), or the answers.
