I also blame modern internet, review, guides, articles you name it, no more room for mystery, the same format also killed the interesting stuff, rumors and whatnot that I used to find in GTA games (especially in San Andreas).
And not much income as a kid to get all of these, also no spam to me with any source I used (TV and Radio would be the equivalent of apps and social media nowadays?), so yeah, the info was there, but you needed to seek for it.