[Sebb767]

Alternative question: Why do I need to download 50 GB of book index to search for that one title and that index can't even do a full text search?

That complexity is Google (or your favourite search engine) running a datacenter indexing exabytes of data so that you can search it in the blink of an eye. Yes, it takes 600ms now instead of 50ms - but that's like complaining that your new eco car engine can't even properly run on aftermarket lamp petroleum.

[noobermin]

What does google's datacenter for a book index have to do with editing a file or rendering a button? That doesn't seem relevant at all to Wirth's law and isn't an justification for the increase in abstraction that has made things slower.