This is nostalgia for the world before a series of "Eternal September" events. In my opinion, it's essentially longing for an internet dominated by a different kind of user than today's majority and no amount of technical solutions will solve that.

It's not necessarily nostalgia nor a feeling that the thing is mainstream so we are not special anymore.

These heavy websites and apps have many consequences:

- security: supply chain attacks. For the user, difficulties to check what runs in the browser (yeah, most users don't know how to do this and/or will not take the time - all the more reason, I'd say).

- software freedom: you end up running a crazy amount of non-free software in your browser, or you are just barred from basic things

- environment: it's a disaster: this stuff requires powerful devices, and probably leads to the disposal of many perfectly capable phones / computers. CIs are spending crazy CPU ticks building and building the app. Complex CDN-based setups to mitigate a bit the bloat.

- cost for the users: after having to buy newer hardware better have a strong data plan for all these heavy wannabe app websites!

- wait time for the users: it's awful the amount of time we collectively waste looking at loaders and slowly loading pages despite crazy bandwidths of today.

- convenience: all this memory and cpu usage leads to worse battery time. If your network is spotty, you'll need to spend a lot of time retrying to load the thing

- inclusion: if you happen to live in an area where you can only afford slow network access, things will be barely usable.

Environmental costs and user costs for developer convenience. As usual, companies externalize costs.

It's not only irrational feelings like nostalgia, it's solid reasons as well.

I do have hope that we figure out at least more lightweight SPAs at some point though.

I wouldn’t say the internet is dominated by a different kind of user nowadays. In the past it was dominated by a bunch of nerds, now it is dominated by Google, a company founded by some old-school nerds. Sure, a much smaller subset of the original nerds that now control it, but is not really a different kind of user.

I dunno. I have zero interest in World of Warcraft Retail, but there's also a smaller World of Warcraft Classic community that I'm thoroughly enjoying a 20-year-old nostalgia boost from.

We cannot make Retail turn itself back into Classic but we can have choices.

This is nostalgia for the world before a series of "Eternal September" events.

The good news is that we're headed right back to the old days before there was an "internet."

Back then, all information was paywalled and siloed in CompuServe, GEnie, Delphi, Quantum Link, American People Link, and a dozen other services.

Today, all information is quickly migrating back into paywalls and silos. Only the names have changed.

spot on