I wonder whether it is the IQ or personality type is the principal component here. Maybe there is some magic intelligence threshold that if cross even at mass scale. Things would just return to the old ways
If you want to understand how different the internet is today from just 15 or 20 years ago, consider that back then there was a site called bug me not where people would post their usernames and passwords to share to get around paywalls, and it worked on most sites