Also - 90s tech generally didn't try to charge you rent for existing. Either you paid them a price for some fairly tangible benefit to your life, or they gave you the service for free fueled by VC dollars (which we now recognize as nurturing dependence so they could charge you rent for existing, but it felt very different in the moment).

I think a lot of the complaints about tech these days come from the feeling that it's trying to own your life rather than improve your life. Things like tractors that won't go if you don't pay their subscription fees; cars that won't go if you don't pay their subscription fees; music collections that you don't actually possess and that go away if you don't pay their subscription fees; photo & backup services that make all your childhood memories go away if you don't pay their subscription fees; proprietary defaults that auto-opt-you-in to these services so you don't realize you can't access the photos without paying their subscription fees; SaaS vendors that hold your business hostage until you pay their subscription fees; search advertising that holds the path to your customers hostage unless all your profits go to them; search/AI engines that are ~70% accurate but don't provide any good way of seeking out alternative information; E-commerce platforms that take your money but give you junk instead; building contractors that take your money but give you junk instead; insurance companies that take your money but don't actually pay out claims; rent that keeps increasing by the maximum amount each year but never bothers to service habitability concerns with the place; and so on.

I think a lot of the frustration today comes from the feeling that people are treading water not to improve their lives, but to make somebody else rich, oftentimes people who aren't working at all.