I agree about overoptimism, and I hope we sort of don't have a renaissance of the open, human internet, and instead we have a renaissance of meatspace.
David Sax, who wrote The Future is Analog back in 2016, has another book from 2022: The Revenge of Analog. It looks at the data from at least the first year or two of Covid and concludes, "Wow, this is awful for humans."
We need to get back to in person meeting with people, and find ways to expand that out again - it's been the default for most of human history, except about the past decade and change. We've tried it, and found it wanting. So let's go back to things we know work.
I'm hopeful about the next generation of teenagers coming up - they've seen the digital destruction caused by smartphones everywhere, and at least some of them are opting to carry flip phones instead of smartphones. We're seeing schools starting to simply ban phones entirely during the day, with massively positive results. So I think the changes are happening!
i've been remote since 2015 and nothing has really changed. niche orgs and niche skillsets, usually highly in demand and qualified, will make it work.
What I mean to say by saying this is that while I understand your use of the royal "we", I don't think you are speaking for everyone. The "things we know work" don't work for everyone and Covid was a welcome break for some of us. And while I wouldn't inflict Covid conditions on everyone just so I could be happier, unfortunately, the inverse doesn't seem to be true. Tyranny of the majority, as usual.