But what I looked forward to most was the included CDs. They would contain so many software, trial wares, free wares, game packs, screensavers, Winamp skins. It was like being a kid in a candy store.
Then came Linux for you, and made me try my first Linux distro - xandros 2003. Then there was the complete 3 DVD Debian distro on LFY made me create an openmpi HPC in college among so many other things completely ignored by the formal education system.
I think there is a real value to limited, quality information like these magazines that the internet ruined. Devs these days have unlimited information at their fingertips - the internet and now chatgpt. But now the onus is on us - are we asking the right questions?
You raise a good question about drowning in the flood of info on the internet. The lack of gatekeepers has upsides as well as downsides. One of those downsides is the lack of quality control. The Linux and computing magazines in India were very high quality and they got a lot of people interested in computing.