[troupe]

> Humanity didn't get good at building houses by building the same house a million times.

The amount of quality variation that we are willing to accept in our houses is much greater than what we are willing to accept in an automobile. The quality of the automobile is BECAUSE we make millions of the same car over and over again.

[akkartik]

But we also went through a period of trying lots of variations that ended up on the road.

I suppose your point is even more valid if we switch to planes. But I'd counter by comparing the levels of regulation between planes and apps. Houses vs apps feels like a fairer comparison on that score.

[troupe]

We still have variation in vehicles and some vehicles are known for being of better quality than others. Dollar for dollar the ones that are produced in the millions are more reliable than the ones that are produced in the thousands.

With software would you expect better quality from an operating system that was one of 50 options each with 100 million of users or something that was one of 5,000,000 options each with 5,000 users? If operating system is an odd corner case, then substitute "Library to Handle Timezones" or something else.

[akkartik]

I think the crux of our disagreement is: is popular software mature enough and regulated enough yet to be worth distributing to 100 million users? I think the answer is overwhelmingly "no". In Carlota Perez's terms, I think we've moved too quickly to the installation phase.

[troupe]

> is popular software mature enough and regulated enough yet to be worth distributing to 100 million users? I think the answer is overwhelmingly "no".

Well it depends on the alternative. If you had to choose between Linux and TempleOS you'd probably get fewer bugs and the ability to do more actual work with Linux. If you had to choose between Windows and TempleOS, you'd probably be able to get more work done with Windows. If you had to choose between MacOS and TempleOS, MacOS would probably let you do more of whatever you were trying to accomplish than TempleOS. Yet TempleOS is only used by a small number of people and only has the resources that you'd expect from something that very few people use.

Now if you are saying that the alternative is to just not use software until it is "mature" you can definitely go back to writing your drafts with pencil and then typing it in a typewriter, but you probably don't actually believe that since you seem to find greater value in using the Internet and software for communication instead of the postal service.

[akkartik]

> Now if you are saying that the alternative is to just not use software until it is "mature"..

I'm definitely not saying that, right? Hopefully OP conveys what I'm saying.

> If you had to choose between Windows and TempleOS, you'd probably be able to get more work done with Windows.

If you bought a stock and the price climbed up 20% for 19 years before falling 100% in the 20th, do you care that the stock was doing very well for a long time? If you can do more with Windows and get hit by a virus that steals all your bitcoin, TemplateOS probably starts looking quite good at that moment. So it's not a quantitative argument for me of "which side lets me do more work." There are qualitative, almost spiritual questions of "what is this work _for_?" and "what sort of lifestyle can I live with?"

[denton-scratch]

> The quality of the automobile is BECAUSE we make millions of the same car over and over again.

I guess that explains why things like modern refrigerators are so much more reliable and durable than the ones that were made 20 years ago. /s

By that reckoning, modern cars should be just about perfect, modulo certain modern expectations like not emitting greenhouse gases?

[troupe]

What I've found fascinating about the refrigerators I've had recently is that the refrigeration process rarely is the part that breaks. However the plastic shelves decompose right about the time the warranty goes out. My guess is that this is by design to sell more refrigerators or $200 plastic shelves.

The reliability of a modern mass produced automobile is incredible. If a software company could produce software with a few defects as a modern automobile they would rule the world.