That also made "war dialing" practical. Not something I engaged in (kind of wish now that I'd been more "interesting"), but the business I was connecting to had to block an ex-employee a couple of times, who kept finding their dial-in number.
Today's systems may be way faster and more "entertaining", in a mass sense. But I miss the old culture.
Including the openness and exchange. If you were interested, and you weren't a jerk, people would bend over backwards to help you. And they enjoyed doing so -- well, most of them. Which is how I ended up on those first systems, anyway.
I think a lot of people miss that culture. But, it just doesn't scale to the general population.
I think that's the crux of it. It worked because it wasn't instantly accessible to everyone. There was a certain minimum level of tech savvy, or at least intellectual curiosity, required. Most people were emotionally invested, at least a little, and that helped form strong communities.
I love that the internet is so egalitarian, but I do miss the days when things were smaller and tighter-knit; when most services were run for love, not for money.
Regardless, the 1200 baud modem, in addition to feeling like it was "keeping up" with the user, also made connecting more convenient.
I never even questioned it. It was just "wow it's so old it just works that way."
In other words, in the old days, phones did not have a jack in the wall - AT&T came to your house and wired their network directly into your telephone. They did not want the RJ-45 jack which made consumer Modems possible. The government forced them to open up their network to other device makers, to competitors.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Carterfone
I really wonder if the modern techno giants would be able to be regulated by the government if they became stagnant monopolies.