"... some PC "guru" decided to reinvent..."
I think you mean decided to _NOT_ reinvent.
Unless you can tell me of a terminal that would render client OpenGL via X in 2002 (minimum for "decades"), then I'm still under the belief that this hasn't been common in GNU/Linux until the last 10 years or so. Maybe it did exist but I never saw it.
There was some proprietary software that did this in certain Unix OS's (Solaris, i think AIX) although not with OpenGL and also wasn't common.
Biting the hand that feeds IT
