>when all it's doing is linking to the publisher's own site
That's not true, however. It is also often including a summary and an image, which is certainly republishing or reposting the content. In no way is it "web-illiterate/ignorant" to refer to it as such, because it is more than just a link.
Google News is ridiculously spartan. It's very old school Google. A headline, a classification, and sometimes a thumbnail. No description or summary or text of any kind
Facebook, yeah, that's something else. One thing that is legitimately bad about that is the way the content can be posted on whatever wall and then a pile of unmoderated public comments put on it, that the publisher has no control over.
I highly encourage you to read Google's statement on how it supports and handles news. The word "often" is load-bearing in your comment, and this provides the details.
