I've really not written as much as I used to - at least not on my personal blog, but I covered finger there and my nostalgia back in August last year. It also did the rounds on here: https://blog.alexellis.io/the-90s-unix-command-fell-out-of-f...

The DNS angle is nice and I get why using a TXT record was interesting for you as a replacement.

I don't think simply having data returned was the issue. It was more about the kinds of data it exposed and doxxed from the user - to anyone with access. That and of course the vulnerability that caused the worm to propagate.

That said - we're seeing RCEs in Node, Python, and other common tools now and they're not going the way of the dodo. So maybe finger's time was simply up - and Facebook, Twitter, etc just took over.

Something ironic about pure text, status info, cgi-bin being replaced by long form video of tigers chasing men and riots. That's what our brains are being fed these days.