Teens have been so accustomed to immediate gratification and short form content they don't possess the willpower to focus on something truly difficult. You can't watch a few shorts and bust out a 4k demo over the weekend the same way you can "make minecraft in 24 hours".
Maybe that's part of it, but I think not having any personal experience with the constraints of early computing is also a factor. The demoscene does try to keep that spirit going on modern platforms with artificial constraints like "Windows exe limited to 64kb" but I think it's harder for someone coming in fresh to appreciate the appeal of that handicap. They definitely won't appreciate the actual retro computer targets like the C64 and Amiga, why would they, those systems came out before they were born and unlike early game consoles they have almost no lasting appeal outside of nostalgia (sorry Amiga fans).
Teens addicted to only instant gratification were never the ones to produce really good stuff in the demoscene anyhow, they will put countless hours into other arenas.
Also back in the mid 1990s maybe the demoscene _was_ instant gratification to get started? You could start doing graphics with "mov eax,13h / int 10 / mov ax,a0000h / mov es,ax / mov di,0 / (loop with stosb).. ".
To get started today with graphics you either setup openGL/d3d with their weird API's with decades of legacy, use something third party (and learn linking/libraries) or write a 3000 LoC hello-vulkan (Or use Unity,etc but then up until 5 years ago you'd get shouted out of the scene due to elitistic attitudes).
Sure you can. I made a 4k demo during a demo party over a weekend. I think people in this thread might be conflating demos with great demos. The quality bar is entirely in your head. Go and watch any live or recorded party and the good demos are only a small percentage. Most are quite average.
