Yes, in the mid-late 90s Internet was making people cleverer. Because we didn't have kids, influencers, politicians and activists on the Internet.

As a former child who was on the internet in the mid to late 90s, this is news to me ;p Come on, eternal September was in ‘93!

Activists on the internet are at least as old as Usenet, as well.

It kind of sounds like this is a list of people you don’t like using the internet, not people who actually made the internet worse (like business majors and programmers that turned every website into SEO mush).