[munificent]

That's survivorshop bias. Yes, occasionally a fork takes over. It very rarely succeeds and usually only in cases where the original is so toxic that it cancels out its own network effects. node.js is a good example of that. And then even there note how they eventually unforked.

[jessaustin]

It is really uncharitable to describe the node fork as "so toxic". People disagreed, but there's nothing wrong with that. I felt like the subsequent "merge" happened fairly quickly and with minimal drama.

Also this seems like a misuse of the term "survivorship bias". You claimed upthread that forks don't work because of network effects. The response was "some forks work". That is a direct refutation, no matter what the percentages are. Besides, you're misunderstanding the varied purposes of forks. I have several forks right now, not because I hate the original maintainers but because it was convenient to change a small thing for my own purposes. Whether or not upstream eventually agrees with me, my fork "works" perfectly well.