This isn't a "gotcha" question; I'm genuinely curious. To me, VR is a new interface layer on top of a massive ecosystem, and the same people are building it. The ecosystem is where the problems exist, and VR is just the latest facade through which we interface with that ecosystem.

In this framing, it's not ascribing old problems to new technology as much as claiming that the new technology magnifies or intrinsically replicates the existing problems.

> The warnings started appropriately early in 2011, there should’ve been regulations in place by 2015

It's 2024 and the regulatory landscape is very poor or nearly nonexistent. Shouldn't this encourage more caution? i.e. we've already proven that looking back and deciding "oh yeah we should have been more careful" hasn't actually resolved the issue, and taking the same approach with emerging tech that has similar pitfalls seems doomed to repeat that.

I also don't think we had any idea what was coming when we were building the stacks that underlie the current web. We now have much clearer mental models of what the Internet and technology in general is capable of, and the resulting warnings are coming much earlier (appropriately, IMO).