"This sounds like parasocial connection standing in for shared cultural experience to me"
no no no, you are not understand, this is the new normal
gone long time a way for you to meet and socialize in your local community. this is the new way
You just miss old times
Or maybe a certain way is better. Or maybe it's better in some aspects and worse in others.
It's already been pointed out in the comments on this article that we went from individual disconnected experiences, to mostly a shared collective experience via radio and TV and lately we went back to individual connected experiences.
I agree with you that it's becoming the new normal. I just don't think the new normal is better, and the old normal still exists.
We opine the enshittification of social media platforms, but seem to largely ignore the enshittification of our in-person social norms and culture by those same platforms.
One of the reasons you have to get people in young (to any product) is so that they forget or just don't even realise/consider what life is could be like without it.
EDIT: There are definitely cultural norms and situations that the current norm improves upon too - perhaps regression to the mean is a better descriptor than enshittification depending on the incoming perspective.