> Microsoft and Apple have both always promoted this sort of learned helplessness with their users, treating the GUI like a tangible thing and not providing obvious tools that encourage programming

It's not exactly helplessness, since programming is no longer required to do the many things that you can do with the millions of apps and web sites that are at your fingertips, and you no longer need to type in (and probably debug) a long program just to play a game.

And Microsoft has actually provided BASIC for ~45 years (currently Visual Basic .NET and VBscript, as well as the Small Basic learning language), while Apple provides Swift Playgrounds (a nice onramp to Swift that can also create full apps.) And every web browser includes JavaScript.

But as you note the key part is obvious tools that encourage programming.

I too would like to see platform owners make programming onramps more obvious and easily accessible. A good start might be adding a CODE button to web browsers to bring up a user-friendly JavaScript programming environment. Another idea might be providing an installation option to include tutorial and professional programming environments. Another might be for the Xbox (and Game Pass) to include game creation tools (I also like Dreams for the PlayStation but it hasn't really caught on.)

At the end of the day though I wouldn't expect it things to change too much because programming requires a lot of effort for minimal reward compared to visiting a web site or downloading a new app or game, while commercial apps and games have largely moved beyond what a single person can create.