I'm sure this is partially true but I don't remember it being the norm. I remember it being harder to find things (Netscape days, Altavista, etc), content embedded in Flash or jsp mess, low resolution, non interactive maps (let alone 3D), low quality audio and video 360p or worse. Dot matrix printing and just generally lower fidelity. Super slow connections requiring the phone line is totally incapacitated while using the net.

I agree that I can't find a recipe without an obnoxious amount of crap writing around it, at least it's there if I scroll far enough. Wikipedia, by the way, suffers almost none of the complaints I see here, loads extremely fast and is free (donate!).

So I guess what I'm saying is it could be better, but the Internet is pretty incredible still.