If that were true, we would not have Let's Encrypt and tools which can give us certificates in 30 seconds flat once we prove ownership.

The real reason was Snowden. The jump in HTTPS adoption after the Snowden leaks was a virtual explosion; and set HTTPS as the standard for all new services. From there, it was just the rollout. (https://www.eff.org/deeplinks/2023/05/10-years-after-snowden...)

(Edit because I'm posting too fast, for the reply):

> How do you enjoy being dependent on a 3rd party (even a well intentioned one) for being on the internet?

Everyone is reliant on a 3rd party for the internet. It's called your ISP. They also take complaints and will shut you down if they don't like what you're doing. If you are using an online VPS, you have a second 3rd party, which also takes complaints, can see everything you do, and will also shut you down if they don't like what you're doing; and they have to, because they have an ISP to keep happy themselves. Networks integrating with 3rd party networks is literally the definition of the internet.

How do you enjoy being dependent on a 3rd party (even a well intentioned one) for being on the internet?

Let's Encrypt... Cloudflare... useful services right? Or just another barrier to entry because you need to set up and maintain them?

I dunno. Self-hosting w/o automation was feasible. Now you have to automate. It will lead to a huge amount of link rot or at least something very similar. There will be solutions but setting up a page e2e gets more and more complicated. In the end you want a service provider who takes care of it. Maybe not the worst thing, but what kind of security issues are we talking about? There is still certificate revocation...