In my case, before the Internet there was "the programming & shareware magazines". They usually included a CD with lots of freeware, shareware and some open sou

In my case, before the Internet there was "the programming & shareware magazines". They usually included a CD with lots of freeware, shareware and some open source too (that's how I got DJGPP or POV, for example). And you needed friends, because it was impossible to buy all the interesting magazines every month, so CD-ROM trading was a thing back then.