Cherrybim, I guess we don’t travel in the same circles. I got married in the 70s and 99% of the weddings I went to had a machitza. They were different from todays weddings. All the women wore colorful dresses. Wearing black was considered strange and incorect. People didn’t stand up as the chosson and kallah walked down the aisle. I once heard Rabbi Moshe Mayer Weiss say on a tape that he has no idea where that came from.
My nephew had a friend who was getting married far away. The chosson’s friends chipped in and sent a few boys as a wedding gift. My son also raised money once to get a few boys to a wedding on the other side of the country.
The chosson shouldn’t be expected to pay for others. If he’d like to, that is another story. I paid for my daughter’s best friend to come to the wedding. She came 2 weeks before hand. I was glad I could afford that. I couldn’t have paid for all her friends to make it. Good thing they didn’t expect it.