The (sorta) Stagnation of the Internet

Have you ever thought about the technological progress from, say 2003 to 2009? From Windows XP SP1 and the early versions of Mac OS X to Windows 7 and Mac OS X Snow Leopard... or just before the release of Halo 2 all the way towards Halo 3 ODST? 6 years might seem like a long time right now, but in terms of technology, it is HELLA SMOL. Now compare that to tech from 2020 to 2026. What extremely notable thing has really happened? Microsoft has repeatedly shot themselves in the foot with the Xbox Series consoles and their intricacies... not to mention Sony blowing their fuck-ing brains out with their opposition to physical media. I mean, Nintendo isn't actually doing too badly, which is kinda awkward since they're usually 2 eons behind anyway (as such with the Wii U, Switch, Switch 2, etc). Like, what happened to all of the cool things we got to see way back when (~10 years ago)? What about major developers interacting with their community, with their fans, or even those that sent letters and emails??? What about 'steaking out' the devs in Halo and actually being sent steaks???

Obviously, this rejection of positive interaction with devs' communities mainly comes from a couple giant factors: GREED and INCOMPETENCE (or over-complacency). For the former, the milking of money from willing people has been getting worser and worser over time. Additionally, the fact that pretty much everyone who has access to the internet is practically always on it only deepens this problem - a key difference from Now vs Then may be that: less people had access to the internet, less people knew how to use it, and more people went outside instead of rotting across the webs all day. The fact that a metric fuck ton more people nowadays are of fully onboarded onto the internet does not help with resisting against overpriced games and programs and whatever else. Hell, it most definitely does NOT help with avoiding scams. This also allows the elderly who are usually NOT onboarded into newer devices and the internet to be scammed... ANYYYYYWAYYYYYYY... this overbearing greed from (mega)corporations has a direct causation to the lower quality of games, and programs, and ETC. Such a case can be seen with Epic Games, who dumped the all-legendary Unreal Tournament in favour of Fortnite. You don't even have to play the games, just take one look at both of them and the difference is LEGIT night and day. Onnnnnnnnnnnly things you had to pay for in the UT series were DLCs!!! Actually no, they were FREE ADDITIONS!!! Whereas in Fortnite (and like every EA game from 2018 onwards, and some Microsoft games, I could go on actually) you have to pay a lotta money to get NOT a lotta skins. I feel like the stripping of what made the games worthy of their titles (such as Halo and UT) really doesn't help the longevity of consoles, and even a significant segment of PC gaming. I mean, imagine naming your dev studio after the game that you ruined (HALO STUDIOS)!!! Nah, actually call them 343 Industries because they DEFINITELY are not worthy over the full Halo title.

Another part of this might be due to marketing. Marketing for big games way back when sometimes went craaaaaaazy... (HALO 3 MARKETING!!!) but every new iteration for a lot of games (and programs) display absolutely ZERO new good qualities/features - some even getting worse over time. I guess you can also sorta link this to the growing pandemic of censorship across the webs but the main goal of megacorporations is really clear: make as much money as possible while putting in as least effort as possible.

Now, moving on to the INCOMPETENCE side of things, both companies and regular consumers have been too complacent with letting someone else take over and do all of their work for them. Wayyyyyy too complacent. If you dont see that right now, then let me make a comparison to the late 90s/early 2000s: it was MUCH harder to get fast internet back then. Hell, for some people it was hard to just stay on the internet. Obviously nobody wanted to waste any potential time on the internet back then since it was kind of a commodity - not always available like it is today. Internet access (such as through dial-up/broadband/xbox live/etc) back then was also expensive. Fun fact: this is where 'SMS language' came from (you can also see this later on in consoles because it was quicker to type with the console on-screen keyboards). Anyway, the main message here is that people HAD to be competent without dwelling in too much complacency. This was the same with corporations like Microsoft back then as the Internet as a whole was still a new concept to a lot of people, which makes sense. The internet allowed us to digitally and quickly transfer a lot of data to other devices, whether 5 metres away or halfway across the globe. People needed help getting used to the internet - which is where Microsoft comes in... through da Windows :D!!! Let's start at Windows XP though - Windows 98 and before were NOT user friendly and let's not even TALK about Windows Me. Windows 2000 was fine I guess but that was business oriented and the whole mass transferring of OSes and ISO files and what not (even if in the digital graveyard) was not yet established. Main point is OSes like Windows XP and Windows 7 were so well remembered in both a home and business aspect is because: they were both easy to use AND help to onboard people into the widening world of computers and the net.

It's honestly kinda sad how advancements in tech and games and stuff has taken a back seat to just complete greed, over-complacency outright stupidity and censorship. I mean, obvi- BUT... there is a silver lining, and that silver lining is that there are communities that contain people like us who wanna make good games (and programs), play good games and bring back the effort and customisation that the internet once had!!! After all, those regions of time where a lot of good tech stuff was happening, was when people were still getting used to the internet and how to use it 'correctly' AND there's that entire thing about transistors approaching the sizes of atoms and quantum tunnelling buuuuuuuuuut I'm not gonna get into that stuff here for... obvious reasons.