Well, yes. And no.

One's opinion on a thing is informative about oneself rather than the thing about which one opines. Subjective claims are about the subject, not the object of the claim. Advertisers and marketers know this. The developers of "the algorithms" know this too.

If you understand the people making claims by analyzing their opinions, then you can develop ways to influence them.

Asking people to comment on one's own writing is asking them to take action by voicing their "thoughts". Some, but not all, of those thoughts may be opinions; others may be actual arguments based on logic and evidence. Opinions are just unevidenced claims; they might be correct - but you can't tell because their unevidenced.

And opinions can and do influence others. The pen is mightier than the sword, and all that.

The biggest problem with the current orgy of opinionation is that opinions are being offered by those who oughtn't have opinions at all on a given subject. It's not that opinions are valued more than facts, but that ignorance is valued more than expertise.