> Could even be that the many-eyes approach encouraged the complexity;
> in fact, that could easily be the unintended consequence.

I suppose it made complexity seem less bad, for a while, but I was thinking economic factors likely drove it to get more complex. Also, I get the impression that some people just love complexity, but these days I'm not so sure. Complexity does have some real benefits.

I hadn't considered this. I just assumed that complexity = job security + sell + lock-in. It's easy to love something that is raking in the cash.