The speed of the Internet increased, opportunities expanded, and intercontinental communication between humans flourished. These are the core concepts of the Internet. However, we as humanity have failed it miserably. It has become the monster it is today. Visiting a website without an ad blocker and anti-fingerprinting technologies is now unimaginable. Ads, cookies, and autoplay videos are just a few of the many annoyances one must endure.
Yet, it was manageable and doable. You could install Pi-hole on your Raspberry Pi, run it as your local DNS, harden Firefox, or even use Tor and its associated browser. The Internet was usable and, to some extent, enjoyable.