Sorry, but I don’t buy the idea that the fans are to blame. Lucas made bad changes when he did the SE. Lucas made bad movies when he made the PT. These things are Lucas’ fault, not the fans. But worst of all was his stubborn arrogant ego driven decision to refuse to treat the oot properly and give it the release it deserves.
Passing blame, a good basis for any relationship. As allways things are a little more complicated in reality. For one a lot of fans like, if not love the SE and the PT. It’s not Lucas’ fault you are not in their camp, a camp that seems to be growing with each year. The SE has now been available in a modern format longer than the OOT, which is slowly becoming a distant memory sadly. There’s no objective truth in this situation, only opinions and factors that can be weighed differently depending on each individual, which include film history and preservation, but also Lucas’ rights as the creator of his works, and a whole bunch of other stuff including Lucas’ relationship with the fans. You weigh them one way, Lucas weighs them another way. Lucas has openly stated: “Why would I make any more [Star Wars movies], when everybody yells at you all the time and says what a terrible person you are?” In other words Lucas didn’t want to make new Star Wars movies at the time, because of fan toxicity. It isn’t too farfetched, to infer that the same fan toxicity may have been a factor (along with a number of other factors) in his refusal to release the OOT.