Lately, I’ve been running into people I haven’t seen in years. They all say the same thing: “Miami isn’t like it used to be.” And they’re right. But maybe nothing ever is.

We had the time of our lives in the late ’90s and early 2000s. No phones. No algorithms. Just music, people, and pure energy. I look back at the photos of the era. Everyone was laughing, sweating, glowing. The pictures looked like freedom. But when I see them now, I can’t help but think, today, half those people have been convinced to hate the other half, and it really affects me.

I know how it happened. I’m a tech nerd. I understand the algorithms. They feed us more of what we already believe, trap us in loops of confirmation, and isolate us in curated little worlds. Over time, that isolation starts to feel normal. The clickbait, the outrage, the bots, it all keeps us addicted. The system isn’t built to fix anything. It’s built to keep us fixated so that we never see ourselves in the black mirror that is a phone with its screen turned off.

Back then, Miami was electric. Everything revolved around South Beach. From 1st Street up to 25th, every block had something going on. You could hop from club to club every night and still never hit them all. When I first moved here in ’99, I didn’t even leave the beach for three years. Why would I? I had a scooter and paradise.

Then came the shift. If I had to pinpoint the exact moment Miami changed, it was when Uber launched in 2014. Before Uber, everything happened on the Beach. Getting anywhere else meant gambling on a filthy yellow cab with cracked vinyl seats, patchouli stench, and a frothy mix of regret and despair baked into the upholstery. Uber changed that. Suddenly, you could leave South Beach easily and come back any time you wanted.

It made everywhere accessible for everyone. Then Wynwood blew up, the Design District became a scene, and Brickell rose into a skyline. The city stretched, and the Beach stopped being the only game in town.

Sure, Miami was already changing. New neighborhoods were being developed, but the real catalyst, the thing that truly launched Miami into becoming the sprawling, connected city it is today, was Uber. It democratized mobility. It connected neighborhoods that had always existed in isolation and redistributed the city’s nightlife economy. Within a few years, downtown, Wynwood, and Brickell were thriving, and South Beach lost its monopoly. The invisible walls that once kept people anchored to the Beach were gone. Suddenly, nightlife, dining, and culture weren’t confined to a few square miles of sand. The city became accessible, and that accessibility changed everything.

So yes, Miami changed. But maybe the truth is, every generation’s Miami changes. Right now, there are thousands of twenty-somethings having the time of their lives in Miami. Crypto bros, DJs, influencers, and OnlyFans models busy trying to figure out how to use ChatGPT to pass their real estate exams. They’ll look back one day about now and say, “Miami isn’t like it used to be.”

Maybe that’s just how it works. Maybe it’s never not like it used to be. Maybe it only ever is what it was. But that’s just my opinion, and I’d love to hear yours.