[pnathan]

My suspicion is that this symptomatic of the mainstreaming of tech. AFAICT from random techie documents from before the web, the 4th perspective was broadly held. (Or perhaps I just have read primarily from hacker sources, which by definition lean towards #4).

[stalcottsmith]

Yes. Reddit 9 years ago was different. Usenet 15-25 years ago was quite different than any significant forum today. Sometimes it feels like I grew up in a country that doesn't exist any more.