[shady-lady]

> highly sophisticated and technical users

I'm pointing out that referring to those users as the above is simply not true.

As you then point out, wealth(direct or by proxy) was the determinant in whether somebody had internet access, not high technical sophistication.

And wealth in and of itself is not a signal of high technical sophistication.

[TeMPOraL]

It wasn't wealth, it was interest. There was a period where the Internet (or PCs in general) were more of a curiosity than anything else, and you had to have some motivation to jump over the complexities of operating a computer and going on-line (not to mention some motivation to buy a PC/get your parents to do it). It served as a natural quality filter for a while.