Great, now instead of just being bored, I get to manage three servers and two dozen public-facing services that I have to maintain for a growing number of users, along with the physical servers themselves, as any cog in this machine may break and burst into flames like a house of cards... and still be bored with the added stress.
Forums. Gaming guides made by actual gamers. Clans that are recognizable and actually respected, playing against the same. Email being the main method of 'notifications'. MSN Gaming Zone. PS2 network gaming, and not having to pay a fucking fee to play with your friends and those halfway around the world. Hosting dedicated servers. Lists of available servers and games to join, instead of this bullshit 'matchmaking'. Modding games, and to an extent programs. Websites not having 50 fucking layers of Javascript garbage just to load what is effectively a static page. Before analytics were everywhere, before ads took more real estate than the content. When Google was just a search engine.
E: Gamespy. Also, I also had someone in vrc recognize my name, and also recalled my clan, from back when we were just a Halo/Custom Edition group. I was so fucking excited, to be recognized, almost 20 years later. My clan is still going, though the numbers are single-digit now. Life happens.
A lot of stuff, but basically, before the internet was shit, and simultaneously, corporations taking over humanity.
The difference between the two types of dumbass is that at least one of them has some semblance of real-world experience, so you'd expect better from them.
Great, now instead of just being bored, I get to manage three servers and two dozen public-facing services that I have to maintain for a growing number of users, along with the physical servers themselves, as any cog in this machine may break and burst into flames like a house of cards... and still be bored with the added stress.
Yaaaaay, hobbies...