For the record, my OP wasn't meant to dispariage hard work by the Zulip team. When one company has 100x the employees of the other, there is a lot of room for

For the record, my OP wasn't meant to dispariage hard work by the Zulip team. When one company has 100x the employees of the other, there is a lot of room for substantive work to be "easily" replicated. My main issue is that HN loves to compare products based on UI features that stand out to front line users, especially dev, and underestimate other aspects (admin features, sales strategy, community development) that drive value for users and success for products. Without attention to these things, you can do good design and difficult engineering without the impact you're looking for.