Older tech did stuff for us. Newer tech does stuff to us. If you think everything newer is better, I can understand that, but it probably means you are young and don’t know what tech used to be like. One small way people try to recapture those times is by opting out of all the latest apps and fuckery and using something simpler and retro. For example, the guy who writes the Game of Thrones books does it all on a DOS command line PC. It works for him and has no distractions. No one is going to hack it because it doesn’t have a network cable.

I have no idea why you want to make this about gender identity. Those parts of your question seem to challenge the name of the sub community.

Please allow me to broaden the context. I used to be an avid motorcyclist. I had a 2000 BMW R1100, which I could service with a modest set of tools. A more modern BMW appears to be very hostile to home mechanics. Even the screws have a corporate head nowadays. Servicing a BMW has become very expensive, as it requires some extremely specialized mechanics (or so they say). My next motorcycle, if I ever buy one, will NOT be a BMW.

It fits in a trend: consumers are being kept from servicing, upgrading or otherwise extending the lifespan of their devices. Repair a smartphone? Good luck. Swap an SSD in your laptop. Tough, buddy. Want to set up your dishwasher. Sure, download the app, give your GPS coordinates and the birth date of your firstborn and you can set it up.

I find a lot more “soul” in older electronics. So many devices today are a minimalist thing with a touchscreen (or worse, thing controlled by your phone), probably designed to force you into a subscription. At least consumerism from a few decades ago operated by innovating to make you want to buy a new product, rather than designing it to be a trap.

Going back to the “soul” bit: I recently bought a Bang and Olufsen Beosystem 2500 (look it up) for my office. It’s a stereo from the very early 90s that cost thousands of dollars in its day. It sounds amazing, and has little touches that just make it cool. Like motorized glass doors that are motion activated, with warm accent lighting when the unit is on. The tape player didn’t work when I bought it, but I was able to replace the belt and now my childhood Where in the World is Carmen Sandiego soundtrack tape is playable again! And with an Aux input, I can also use it for modern stuff too to take advantage of what we’ve gained in media playback since ~1991.