I'm probably in the vast minority but I just think its the other way round to how you described it. People didn't demand short form, and thus businesses listened and created. No, the businesses researched to find the most basic, lizard-brain element of the human psyche that they could exploit for profit and pushed it to an audience who couldn't resist, who in hindsight probably wouldn't have wanted if they knew ahead of time the psychological and social repercussions.
Of course specific front ends for short and long makes sense I'm not whining about that specifically, but nobody cares about blogs?
How about academic content, news/politics, storytelling, poetry, 'how to', charity, transcriptions, reddit-style discussions... there's a TON of applications for long-form content beyond basic blogs, as well as short. It's nice to be welcoming to both/all options.