My theory is generational and knowledge shifts, namely that now we're seeing the first substantial cohort of non-techies with a decent understanding of tech culture and politics. This is also why we see a lot more anti-AI and anti tech CEO sentiment among the young than the old in defiance of our previously held assumptions.

This is about the right time for the children, nieces, and nephews of the first and second big generations of post-Web software engineers, IT workers, etc. to be getting old enough to become a political force. There's been an explosion of tech workers since the mid-90s, and that means an explosion of people related to them as well. The kids who watched their parents be stacked ranked at Amazon, saw the difference in how MS treated contractors and employees, listened to their corporate IT parents talk about how hostile MS is, etc. all learned that the big tech companies are not anyone's friend even if the specifics of the tech go over their heads. And while the workers themselves might keep their heads down and be quiet in public for the sake of their careers, their kids and relatives are less constrained.

And they can talk to each other and find that it's a common sentiment. Since they don't necessarily have technical careers or hobbies, they're also able to export this sentiment to a wider variety of people through overlapping hobbies and interests (e.g. the IT guy at a school in suburban Ohio has a kid who's a theatre nerd, and the kid is good at communicating their anti big tech position to this 'new' group of people).

The distribution of knowledge about how tech companies operate is shifting and diffusing into channels and communities it didn't before.