To be honest I think I really like “long jumps in time”. It’s like the author builds up a world that you understand and care about, and then it becomes a backdrop of this new world, which adds another layer of complexity. There are parallels to notice and explore, “how things might turn out” tales, etc.

The one other author I’ve seen pull it off was Brandon Sanderson in his Mistborn trilogy, though he does it 2 times (once for each book) where the previous one becomes “the legends” for the next one, with all the misunderstandings that this usually entails.

Yeah, they're really 2 different books.

BUT, I enjoyed the 2nd half as well. The 1st book is already obsolete technologically in some ways (launch technology has progressed a lot in the last 5 years)[0], although very interesting. Which is one reason I like the 2nd part in that it extrapolates from the sociocultural/technological developments of the first book to see what the ultimate consequences could be.

The book is also a sharp commentary on the destructiveness of social media...

[0]side note: the speed of progress that SpaceX is achieving with Starship in Boca Chica is comparable to a pace you'd want in the first book... They're going so fast in Boca Chica, as if the Moon fell apart and they only have a couple years left before the Hard Rain to make humanity a multiplanetary species...

Also, the author has an inexplicable obsession with chains moving in free space. (Okay, I get it, it's cool physics, but how is it any more practical than using a mega-catapult as an airport?)

Agreed, the first half was semi-realistic hard science fiction, the second half felt more like fantasy almost. It wasn't bad, but such a huge shift from the first half.

Strong agree. Luckily you can just stop reading at the end of part 1 and it’s still a very satisfying book.