I've definitely considered that thought over the years, again and again. I do think there truth to it and plays some role here, but overall would respectfully disagree with it as a flat out conclusion if used as a dismissal in this case. It's worth expanding on because you're not just wrong outright, it's impossible to objectively state that nostalgia isn't a factor, but I truly do think I'm onto something here on witnessing the home PC market first-hand from the beginning. It really was special because of the intimate nature of it, "home PC" market.

The reasoning that immediately comes to mind is two-fold.

The first is the obvious point I made, where from the very start I place books as the supreme medium, and are far before my time. The written word can be information dense, puts your mind and imagination to work and if in a book, never needs recharged. :) It's just underrated, underappreciated. Books are "inferior technology", which to me is the ideal abstraction layer for our species. I think we'll continue to see back to basics as a movement as corrosive societal effects from "social media" plays out. We need real community, the kind humans evolved for, not that marketing nonsense chewing people's brains up and spitting them out only left with capacity for short-term attention spans. Most people don't need help with that. Facebook is the new smoking. Things don't always get better with every generation for billions of years, nor do most witness great change. You're assuming that because the last 300 years have been relatively action-packed. Mostly thanks to Europe's astonishing leap forward around 1600AD in and out into the world. Things are objectively worse today from the 20th century, everyone knows it or can definitely feel it. The deck is stacked against a young person with opportunities slowly dwindling. That trend may continue if we don't solve capitalism collapsing on itself in the western world, discover new antibiotics, among numerous other very serious challenges that aren't being effectively addressed. Our big, impressive move lately (speaking for the US) is simply cutting taxes when already at historically low rates. Brilliance.

The second thought I had is that the home PC space undeniably hit it's stride from ~1980-2000. That's just when that market had its golden age. Combine it with the arcade experience of the day, and you had a sensory experience that really isn't even widely available today anymore. You can't really explain it to someone who didn't see it. It's not just generational placebo. It's like the circus. They hardly exist now, but they were worth the trip and I regret many kids may never go to one. Someone who did miss the way it was before would likely insist I'm just a fool, but Netflix and Youtube is not a fair replacement for these things. They're just not.

You have to go hunting for an arcade today, and I'm not even sure if there are any truly modern ones around. A kid just won't get that sensory experience, which isn't just technological but the social element of all the kids being there too. That goes without mentioning the loss of comic books stores that kids rode their bike to(!), toy stores, candy stores, Saturday morning cartoons and all the waiting, anticipation and excitement attached. Just nostalgia? Or is it real. The examples sound real.

Back to addressing your point, certainly the cotton gin, the steam engine, home electricity (which my grandma told me about when they were the first house in town to have it installed because her dad was so enthusiastic about it), among others, were more monumental on a macro level than seeing the home PC space explode from 1978 to 2000. Yet I have my doubts that an old timer was passionately reminiscing about "seeing the cotton gin come to be", and how amazing it was. It harkened great change to society, but I'm not sure people were living their lives in a way at that point to personally experience rapid iteration as people witnessed in the home PC market. Being a market specifically targeting them/us. It really is different today than it was then, it has normalized, there's less excitement for sure, and it's far more difficult to be impressed with advancements.

We're at the point now where we need to go back to step one, bring back creativity. That's why I circled back to books being the ultimate medium. What good is an 8K TV is there's nothing good to watch? Zero. I'm back to hunting for good books instead. Choose Your Own Adventure were better than what Hollywood is putting out today. Writers often do the best job at expressing thought-provoking creativity, which without that human spark of creativity injected into your technological medium, it would all be pointless.

From our human perspective at least, once they're unleashed, our AI overlords won't care.