I don't think the type of content you're looking for even exists any more.
Even if someone has the desire to create a high quality, old-school, interest-based site, they're going to be dealing with the fact that Google won't surface the content because SEO magic, there is no community of similar sites who will link to them, and their content doesn't fit the format preferred by social media.
I think the web has firmly shifted to being about commercial entities having a way of plugging content into Google. The initial premise, a web of carefully curated links between long-lived documents, is dead. And the people who would have created websites if they grew up in the 90s and early 2000s have moved onto other formats.
Even if someone has the desire to create a high quality, old-school, interest-based site, they're going to be dealing with the fact that Google won't surface the content because SEO magic, there is no community of similar sites who will link to them, and their content doesn't fit the format preferred by social media.
I think the web has firmly shifted to being about commercial entities having a way of plugging content into Google. The initial premise, a web of carefully curated links between long-lived documents, is dead. And the people who would have created websites if they grew up in the 90s and early 2000s have moved onto other formats.