I would add another important point: earlier, there was nothing like NNTP. So when someone showed you "the Internet", they showed you email, gopher (later the web), IRC and so on. These were separate services with unique features. The appearance of CGI and dynamically generated content was a big revolution at that time. Then, everything converged in the web, and when Google took over the newsgroups, there was practically zero incentive for new Internet users even learn what NNTP was.