When software becomes popular enough, it begins to have its own gravity, and rather than only being shaped by its users' needs, it starts to shape its users' needs.
Let's say there is some common business task that needs to be done. Maybe it's a legal filing with the local government, or tracking how many people at the company are using a particular piece of software for licensing purposes, or records-keeping for equal opportunity employment questionnaire responses. There are many ways to accomplish each of these goals, but most people will be familiar with the SAP way. The laws on the books will be written by people who have used SAP before, and public comments on the law will be made by people who have used SAP before. Ancillary tools to do niche features that SAP doesn't cover will work best if you've adopted the SAP way.
And so, SAP becomes enshrined into the law and society in a way that's impossible to duplicate. Even if you mimicked SAP's features 1:1, there would still be obscure quirks and bugs that you didn't capture but are nonetheless somehow beneficial to users' workflow, because those quirks and bugs have been imprinted onto the standard business practices in our world.
Let's say there is some common business task that needs to be done. Maybe it's a legal filing with the local government, or tracking how many people at the company are using a particular piece of software for licensing purposes, or records-keeping for equal opportunity employment questionnaire responses. There are many ways to accomplish each of these goals, but most people will be familiar with the SAP way. The laws on the books will be written by people who have used SAP before, and public comments on the law will be made by people who have used SAP before. Ancillary tools to do niche features that SAP doesn't cover will work best if you've adopted the SAP way.
And so, SAP becomes enshrined into the law and society in a way that's impossible to duplicate. Even if you mimicked SAP's features 1:1, there would still be obscure quirks and bugs that you didn't capture but are nonetheless somehow beneficial to users' workflow, because those quirks and bugs have been imprinted onto the standard business practices in our world.