The internet feels like a ghost town. Bots flooding ai generated memes and fake responses is the best tell. Forums are dead. Outside of here you can't find any sort of engagement any more. It's very likely many internet users go a whole day without interacting with a single human post, poster, or content. I compare it to a fish tank. 100 gallons and 20 fish. Suddenly increase the tank to a billion gallons and keep the same 20 fish but toss a USB stick with millions of fake fish on it in there. Same 20 fish, tank got bigger, but most of the chill spots were destroyed by the addition. The effect is that the internet shrank even though infrastructure got bigger.