You're mostly right, the problem is also that users don't upgrade their Python distribution very often, so they miss out on new features. > Maybe there should

You're mostly right, the problem is also that users don't upgrade their Python distribution very often, so they miss out on new features. > Maybe there should be a system where specific network-sensitive stdlib modules could be updated faster than the rest. This is essentially what `setuptools` does, by putting a package on PyPI that monkeypatches/plugs in to the stdlib.