They make a quite capable desktop machine when plugged in, with the benefit of portability, and definitely better than a 2010 laptop

It is because, especially when it comes to anime, there are 2 popular ways of watching. One is the original audio with subtitled translation, and the other is dubbed audio. Often done by different groups, and the dubbed audio is often changed and less of a literal translation so it matches the video better. however this often leads to the situation above, unless the dub has closed captions created specifically for it.

In 1976 there wasn’t much of an IT department to be had

This would make so much more sense tbh, federating communities would also help bring the people who don’t quite ‘get’ the fediverse yet into coming onboard instead of being lost.