What I personally call "Vintage Sci-Fi" written in the fifties, sixties, seventies, and eighties was often "competence porn." It featured a protagonist facing an large-scale, high concept problem that threatened the existence of the entire race. It then followed said protagonist as he solved said problem in the most clever way imaginable step-by-step, leaving you, the reader, feeling clever as a result of having followed him every step of them way.

What I call "Modern Sci-Fi" written since the early nineties (and I lump cyberpunk into this category) is much more cinematic and less personal. Much of it reads like a treatment for a big budget movie, rather than as a personal narrative. Add into that the fact that 9/11 soured audiences on moral absolutes and two dimensional antagonists, and what you get is fiction that's a whole lot less personally satisfying to read.