> In the 80s and 90s there was much more idealism than now.

that idealism was already fading by then, which had started much earlier in the preceding decades (see, memex/hypertext etc)

  > tech has devolved into a big money making scheme with only the minimum necessary actual technology and innovation

in the end, they are businesses, so it could be assumed that such orientation would take over in the end eventually though, no?

its the system of incentives we all live under (make more money or die)