i can't see it was a psyop but was definitely oversold. it works well when it works, and when it doesn't people are quick to reeee. there's also some vested interests in saying "lightning bad, use my solution".
it's likely that most people are not able to operate a well connected operational node.
acinq's LSP model works well.
Ark is promising but idk about relying on an ASP so much.