Well you say that as a joke, but back in the day this was a real thing. Not exactly downloading, because the internet wasn't really a thing back then, but using software to gain more ram.
I was a big fan of QEMM myself and had it in the original box with all the manuals and such. I already had a pirated version through the sneakernet, but got the original on sale as well. I still have that box somewhere.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/QEMM
At allowed DOS and other TSRs to be loaded into what's known as upper memory. This is the memory in between 640KB and 1MB. This area often wasn't used as it can't be accessed through regular addressing. Tools that need more memory could often address the space above 1MB and was designed for machines with 2 or 4MB (or more). As most games and other software was limited to 640KB it could be a pain in the ass to manage that memory. Often selectively not loading certain drivers at boot to leave enough memory for the more hungry software.
With QEMM this was no longer an issue, shoving a lot of stuff from below 640kb to above, leaving a lot of memory free all the time.
Later some of this was also implemented directly into DOS (I think MSDOS 5 but also other non MS OSes had this). Although I think by that point high memory was often used (the first little bit above 1M). But by that time most machines had more than 2MB of memory and games and other software often used all of the memory, not limited to 640KB. Software developers often used DOS extenders to act as middlemen where the software can access all of the ram without any complexity needed. The extender could just handle it without any issue and the developer could focus on their software instead of mundane things like memory access.
Note the often wrongly attributed 640KB quote of Bill Gates stems from the era. But he never said it and nobody thought that at the time. It wasn't even a real DOS limitation, more of an IBM architecture limitation. And that became the defacto standard which made it harder to fix.
That's no longer the way it works in this new economy (at least in the US). About 50% of all consumer spending is done by the top 10% of incomes. Companies have figured out they can either join the race to the bottom, fight with the competition and eak out meager profits. Or they can just make shit expensive as fuck, have record profits and still have enough customers in the rich. By simply doing less for more money, they can earn more even though the total amount of sales and customers has gone down. The decline in sales is easily offset by the higher prices, leading to more revenue and more importantly way more profit.
This is why there are so many people living pay check to pay check, unable to afford needed stuff and on the edge of losing everything. While at the same time the markets are doing better than ever, so many companies are having record profits across the board. And this trend is expected to continue in the near future. The rich are spending while the other 90% are unsure about the future and limit spending. This furthers the divide between rich and poor and makes companies target the rich and forget about the rest.
Maybe some crazy person would take the risk and try to make something for the other 90%. But in doing so they have to work a lot harder and margins would be slim. Costs are up on everything and anything, so making something regular people can actually afford is hard. Let alone do that and make a profit and be able to keep quality at a proper level. The quality would suffer, lots of outsourcing would be involved, meeting any sort of regulations is hard and costly let alone optional targets like the environment and being sustainable.
The only way companies see a future for less rich folk is with subscriptions. Just load everyone up with a shit load of cheap subscriptions. Can't afford a new $1000 appliance? Not a problem, you get it now and pay later. Not mentioning that pay later means pay forever and the total amount paid is way more than $1000. Plus people have a hard time managing finances with a lot of small loans and subscriptions. It's all abstract till they get overwhelmed with debt. Something that happens more and more each day.