Great article! I was particularly impressed with your "garage-building" analogy. Although it has some merit, I have always been strongly (not totally) anti-KISS (Keep It Simple Stupid) or its latest incarnation of YagNi. Your analogy really points out the pitfalls of this approach. Of course there is the other side of the argument that having to totally rewrite a complex application to add some minor functionality which was not envisioned in designing the foundation, is what keeps us employed and making the "big bucks".