It is so bizarre to me that building a business that can make a profit and stand on its own is considered newsworthy in the tech economy.
A company that can "make a profit and stand on its own" is of no interest to a venture capitalist.
We're just talking about being publically traded here, a company doesn't have to die or be consumed to be able to make its investors whole.
Can you imagine Apple, Google, Facebook existing without the model? Because each needed large capital investments before turning a profit. Equity investment was the only obvious solution for that large upfront capital, as tech companies normally don't have collateral with which to secure debt. Such equity investments are high-risk by nature, so investors want high potential rewards.
Thus, it stands to reason that such companies wouldn't have succeeded if there weren't a mechanism for high-risk, high-reward equity financing. I'd argue that all of these companies are functional and also that they've made consumers' lives demonstrably better.
Maybe few question it because it's worked so well?