The OS gets upgraded and debugged, yes. But that's all. This is why broadband is going to be a long time coming. This occurred to me at a recent ISPcon event in Baltimore, where Charles Ardai, CEO of Juno, told me that dial-up subscribers are increasing in numbers, not decreasing. With all this talk of broadband, you'd think that the tide would have turned by now.
Most activity targets the dial-up user, making broadband just a luxury.
And in some cases, it may be an unnecessary luxury, as full-speed feeds to broadband users are fairly rare. As for surfing, I prefer broadband, because the overall Web experience is improved. But I've noticed recently that the dial-up connection I experience when traveling is not as dreadful as it was in the past. The backbones have improved, and dial-up is more tolerable than before. We heavy Internet users see things differently and assume that everyone wants to be like us.