[reilly3000]

I think the whole idea of simplicity vs complexity, and the linked article "Worse is Better" is fundamentally ill-conceived. Simple vs. Complex is contextually relative. Literally every observer is subject to their own opinion of a design. Success in the wild = success. I think success in the wild, especially in our age of information overload, depends on being "convenient to understand and operate".

A 'simple' solution may not be easy to grok. Few people think at the level of axioms.

A survivable solution must be passed along to many people across generations.

For some, monorepos are simple because that is what they know, for others multirepos are the norm. The survival of the firms that adopt these strategies will somewhat dictate what repo strategy propagates in the world, not the best design.