Another example is Google search remove the ability to perform exact text search such as "some phrase I found important to search". Maybe based on statistic, it was 20% of user using that, 80% of users does not rely on this feature. The logic is saying messing up 20% of user is not a problem. We are serving the 80% of users pretty great.
The current paradigm of UX design for providing "good default" to serve 80% of users and removing customization to screw 20% of advanced user makes me pretty helpless for using modern app. That's why I prefer cli nowadays for the flexibility of those software.
> This is a feature that is really not often used, whose omission is not fatal, which often requires several tries to get right, and which is increasingly less useful thanks to gradual changes on the Web.
How often do you visit small indie websites in non-English languages? Because in my experience, as soon as you do, this is not a rare occurrence.
I think your example of emergency services is a bit hyperbolic. This is a feature that is really not often used, whose omission is not fatal, which often requires several tries to get right, and which is increasingly less useful thanks to gradual changes on the Web. Much more widely-used features like FTP and Flash have been deprecated; people howl and yell every time, but yet things still seem to work.