These "nice ideas about different types of file" are not new. On the contrary, before Unix, this was common and it was one of the revolutionary approaches of Unix, that files - from an OS perspective - should be streams of bytes and nothing more.
I think before UNIX there weren't nice APIs for different types of file access. It was more like getting a raw block device and being told "fill your boots".
stream-of-bytes was the right idea then. It doesn't mean it is still right.
