In the 1980s we downloaded games from the radio

funny to think that there was a blip of people downloading software over the radio in the 80s, then the internet happened and it was all over hardwire, and now virtually all software is downloaded over the radio again

Even if most devices receive data wirelessly these days, the transfer to its last wireless transmitter will be almost entirely wired. Mobile masts are wired, wireless routers are wired, and so on. That being said, consumer devices are but a part of the much larger group of digital devices connected to the internet in some fashion, and a lot of them remains wired to the internet. "Virtually all software" being downloaded wirelessly feels like a big claim.

And this is not entirely an exercise in pedantry and semantics, since traditional radios were not wired, they weren't the "last transmitter" in a long chain, but were rather often _the_ transmitter. The data for download had to be physically moved _to_ the radio station. (I believe wireless extenders for radio exists, and maybe even some wired for larger coverage, but my understanding is radio still remains exceedingly local, and national stations are largely transmitted via the internet first.)

Though a quick aside; it's funny that you refer to wireless as radio, when in radio's infancy, it was most commonly referred to as "wireless" (e.g. "on the wireless").

In the UK transfer to the last wireless transmitter in radio are almost always wired (ISDN or similar back in the 80s). Wireless repeaters were used in the early days of TV, but rare for radio

Microwave links used to be used to transmit TV, calls and data before fibre became commonplace. Presumably also radio for nationwide stations at least.