I really wish a longform document/essay/dissertation was done on how impactful the loss of Google Reader but the thriving of Twitter and Facebook ruined the internet and allowed clickbait and shortform incendiary content to thrive.
The profit incentive is far more powerful force in shaping the internet into what it is today than any single product demise.
Profit is powerful but control is far more so. Frankly, Google fucked up and bit the hand that fed it. That strategy has been financially successful, but did so at the expense of hyper-stimulating Facebook and Twitter. I'd go as far to say that if Google invested in what Reader had represented, a marginal business like Twitter would have vanished or been absorbed long ago.
Reader was a niche product albeit an important niche with lots of important users.