The internet.
No, really, it was way better. 2001 - 2007 was a golden age for a lot of things.
The whole eternal September thing had passed, and somewhere in 1998 or 1999 things started to even off. Being on the internet during 9/11 was an incredible experience. Every single forum, BBS, and website stopped what they were doing and just talked. It was the first time I had ever had a global experience like that. I think it was the first time for a lot of people. For a younger guy at the time, it was haunting. I wasn't just watching the news - I was reading posts and moments from people who were actually in NYC. I read that the 1st tower was falling before my news broadcast showed it. That was a weird moment for me.
Between 2003 and 2006ish, forums in general were still small. The dominant comedy communities at the time were Something Awful and Fark, and both of them produced excellent content. There were other weird places too - albinoblacksheep, stileproject, newgrounds - but SA and Fark were kings. A ton of internet humor is sourced from SA, and 4chan even came from a subforum on SA. Fark was like the little brother who, honestly, deserved the spotlight sometimes, but both boards warred in a friendly manner.
Trolling was actually funny, rather than going straight for the "lets see how offensive I can get" strategy employed today. If it is still around, go and look up when SA invaded The Dating Game Online. It wasn't necessarily malicious in any way, it was legitimately hilarious for all involved parties.
Things were just easier to get if you were technologically savvy. Major message boards used to be pretty fucking cavalier about things; SA used to have gigantic torrent subforums that were some of the best things around at the time. Sure, there was Oink, but NMP3s did the same thing. BTB was a fucking madhouse. With the death of the SA file forums, it seemed like public (and private) replacements had to pop up overnight. A few of those replacements live to this day. I'm nearly 100% certain that the popularity of the SA file forums was one of the key things that lead to widespread adoption of torrenting.
The world before social media is kind of strange to think about, and in some ways I think the early years of social media were very cool. It was an actual way for people to unite for awhile, and there was an intense rush when I started actually making contact with friends from childhood that I had never found again. Could you believe that I could hang out with someone daily for eight years, move away, keep in contact via phone for another year, and then never ever hear from them again? People would effectively disappear like that... I could go through a phone book, I guess, or call the operator and hope they live in the same city?
Honestly, the modern internet is pretty fucking cool too. But it just isn't 2003. Things don't feel quite the same as they used to.