alt Hacker NewsOnline cheating as existed for as long as online games have existed. Long before companies cared about online gaming as a serious generator of revenue. There is a certain percentage of the population which enjoys hurting others and making them have a bad time. The anonymity of online games allows them to be antisocial with very few social repercussions.
I think equating having the option of KLAC with Windows is totally disingenuous. There are countless other differentiators. You would be free to just not use KLAC if you so desired.
The "anonymity of online games" is much greater than it used to be. It used to be standard practice for people to host their own private servers and play with people they knew. This naturally filtered anti-social behavior because people knew they wouldn't get invited back. And public servers were a more casual environment, where the occasional cheating wouldn't ruin any serious competition.