[Aurelsicoko]

Our brains love new things. Whenever we see or experience something new, they release dopamine that makes us feel good. That’s why we enjoy keeping up with the latest news, events, or technology. It’s part of being human, and it won’t change.

With each new wave of technology, things improve, even if they look the same on the outside. For example, today’s huge online stores weren’t possible 10 or 15 years ago. Innovations, like better system design and separating different parts of a website’s function, made this possible. New frontend tools pushed content systems to be more focused on APIs, leading to headless CMS platforms (Contentful, Strapi, etc).

I believe the next big change will be about using less energy when browsing the web. This could lead to new tools, hosting technologies, or apps. While websites might still look similar, the experience will keep getting better in small, meaningful ways. Another cycle of improvement is just around the corner.

[PaulHoule]

(1) The OP is saying that some people don't feel this way, in fact they feel overwhelmed by new things. I think most people feel bored if they don't get enough novelty and they feel overwhelmed if they get too much. Different people have different tolerances at different times and in different situations. Since we are "in it together" we often have to deal with other people who want more or less novelty than we do.

(2) I want roll my eyes at the bit about "dopamine". It's true, but in the same sense that "adenylate cyclase is activated" and "proteins get phosorylated" and "genes are expressed" and so forth. Your brain is a complex system and anything it does involves the coordination of many kinds of neurons. Scientists know a lot more about it than you or I and there is vastly more that they don't know about it. Probably every kind of neurotransmitter is involved when you see something on social media and repeat it.

(3) I remember Amazon being pretty big in 2000. I'll grant that you can provide people with a richer experience with front-end tech but I don't see SPA being needed to make a store with more items or that handles more users. I remember circa 2011 that many of the web designers in my town who were really good at making Ruby on Rails app seemed to think they couldn't sell that kind of system to customers and they struggled mightily with AngularJS and other frameworks. They regained their footing with React. (Has a bit of that "worse is better" feel like C. I want to like Vue but I can draw whatever I want the way I want to draw it with React.) What appeals to me about heavy front ends is really new stuff like

https://aframe.io/

I mean being able to deliver 3-d content to desktop and mobile and jump into an immersive world is really cool and makes my brain feel good.

(4) Are you talking about energy use on the front end, back end or on the huge spiderweb of wires, fiber optic cables, amplifiers and such between them?