Whilst I do see your point, I still 'get a kick' out of designing and prototyping idea's - its just now the bar is set higher, so the 'stuff you can make' can be much more complicated than it was 20 years ago, for the same cost and design time. Whats changed is the complexity modern integration has afforded us.
I've always considered myself a 'hardware guy' but of course write software and firmware. Like software, hardware can be thought of as modules - you design them once and re-use them as and when you need to - perhaps making a few minor changes to adapt them for specific applications. There isn't much point in designing everything from scratch/first principles every project when you've already done it. That means that many software and/or hardware apps are pretty much just older designs stitched together. Where do you draw the line between 'made from scratch' and 'bolting modules together' ?
What with the ability to share vast amounts of information in free online storage - people can share millions of lines of code, and thousands of schematics, BOMs, gerbers and so where-as maybe 20 years ago, there were freely available existing designs/ideas/code it wasn't particularly common or easy to access. These days if someone wants say, a 2-pole LPF do they sit down with a pencil, paper and their own knowledge and draw a schematic, using maths to work out the values? Or do they google for a schematic, or use an applet calculator, or free sim software to do it for them, taking minutes? Same with writing drivers for LCD displays, SPI devices, reading sensors etc.. given the huge number of people who design electronics both for work, and as a hobby, who share the fruits of their labour, its silly not to google it first. Sure people might not learn about such systems much, but I'm sure they will when they need to.
And again, many years ago, if someone produced a board with a large microcontroller, some analogue, a display, LED's etc.. you would probably think that they know their stuff. These days that can be 'made' with limited knowledge of the basics, much quicker and cheaper, so the 'value' of such a system as highlighting knowledge has diminished. So whilst you may remember the days when stuff like that was impressive, these days it has to be much more complicated to be considered impressive, which for a hobby I find refreshing - it means I don't stop learning new things. Also don't underestimate how many people who do electronics as a hobby have the 'how does it work?' instinct, after all, its that trait which is probably why most people become interested int he subject. I still almost obsessively try to work out how something works, and feel uncomfortable using 'black boxes' without knowing the intimate details of its inner workings. You may see the 'maker crowd' seemingly not caring about how their modules work but I believe those are in the monitory.
As for taking the fun out of it - there is always more to learn. Whether or not you find that rewarding is up to you but you have to accept times have changed. If you don't find what you are doing rewarding - try something else, lord knows there are many areas of electronics to delve into, FPGA's, RF, microwave, audio. As as I tried to hammer home in my previous post - it is easier than ever to get started, in any area.
The days where electronics as a 'useful' hobby - that is, using your knowledge and wits to build something that solves a real problem - aren't over yet. It is just we see more and more novelty or 'gadget' projects being posted in hackaday, instructables, maker etc.. that use $120 worth of prebuilt modules, a ridiculously powerful raspberry pi and large OS's to make a string of LED's pulse to music. That is the hobby side! you may not see the point, but the creators do it for shits'n'giggles. Sure the design is completely overkill so is hardly commercially viable, but its a hobby.
Also remember, those who post their projects - the projects you read about on tech websites, forums etc.. are biased towards projects that are either really useful to people, so they share - niches like RC, meteorology, audio, guitar pedals - or those who just want to show off. I suspect that there are many many things people have designed to solve a problem they have, being very clever about it, but don't' feel the need to post because it was so specific to their need, and was done 'to solve the problem' rather than share. If one was to try and capture the general state of 'hobbyist electronics' by googling, they would probably see much more of the above than anything else, but that doesn't mean to say its so.