[adaptiveValleys]

The criteria for adaptive evolution, in the classical Darwinian sense, are:

1). Reproduction. 2). Variation between the products of reproduction. 3). Heritability between those variants. 4). Differential success among the variants.

Anything that has those four characteristics will experience adaptive evolution. Where it gets really fascinating is when you realize it applies to things that don't go through biological reproduction, for example the graphical user interface.

[zepearl]

Well, about the GUI: I'm not sure that that's following the rules; most try to blindly follow trends, big companies tend to impose their GUIs, many implement anything which is low-effort (therefore already made available by 3rd parties), etc... => I don't see much selection/competitiveness here.