As someone who develops professional software in a private company, we absolutely 1) built a lot of features fast based on user requests, which created a clunky UI. Now, we're 2) doing a redesign which, while not a total code refactor, requires discipline and cohesion to reflect deeply on what use-cases we want to support specifically, as opposed to trying to be everything to everyone. We're incentivized to do this because we can grow revenue by building well crafted software for the most popular use-cases. We just expect that this is a "circle of life" for well crafted software, of 1) building features fast, then 2) polishing the best features leveraging professional ui/ux designers and product insights: to re-simplify once you reach a certain level of complexity.
I now think of most open source projects as just as good as closed-source at 1) building the functionality and MVP UI/UX, but that there is more friction to communication overhead to do 2), as well as less incentives (smaller carrot, smaller stick). To decide on specific priorities, bring in a designer (who might be non-technical) that can fully understand the context, and then potentially change or move around a bunch of code, is not something that "just happens organically by people scratching their own itch"
I think projects that are high profile like blender have done better here over time, often when there are well resourced and governed foundations or companies backing them. Or occasionally an OSS author will do this. Though I think that's the exception rather than the rule, and certainly requires a larger breadth of skills that extend beyond pure technical ability.
I now think of most open source projects as just as good as closed-source at 1) building the functionality and MVP UI/UX, but that there is more friction to communication overhead to do 2), as well as less incentives (smaller carrot, smaller stick). To decide on specific priorities, bring in a designer (who might be non-technical) that can fully understand the context, and then potentially change or move around a bunch of code, is not something that "just happens organically by people scratching their own itch"
I think projects that are high profile like blender have done better here over time, often when there are well resourced and governed foundations or companies backing them. Or occasionally an OSS author will do this. Though I think that's the exception rather than the rule, and certainly requires a larger breadth of skills that extend beyond pure technical ability.