Many of us only used it because it was free/available for everyone and we were students or stuck in another situation were it was the only option. If there was

Many of us only used it because it was free/available for everyone and we were students or stuck in another situation were it was the only option. If there was both a webmail interface and imap we chose imap. Some of us still to this day prefer imap/jmap/exchange if the server support it in a meaningful way.