[AlbertCory]

I am deeply, deeply cynical about the notion of "technical debt." Why?

Because it is inextricably tied to career ambitions. There is no promotion benefit to just "paying back" a small debt by fixing some kluge, while there is enormous benefit to leading a rewrite.

Furthermore, once a rewrite is in play, the temptation to "just fix" a bunch of other things and add some new features that were hitherto impossible is irresistible. Perhaps the debt repayment gets added to Version N+1.

You can say "oh, it doesn't have to be that way" and point to some glorious time when it wasn't, but in my experience, at least, it always is.

[billytetrud]

Rewrites aren't fixing technical debt. Rewrites are letting your last version declare bankruptcy

[AlbertCory]

Indeed. I was saying that a "debt fix" release quite often turns into a rewrite, no matter what the original justification was.