The initial cost is quite low and there are techniques to reduce the growth factor, but I’ve seen no evidence of anything that reduces this below an exponential

The initial cost is quite low and there are techniques to reduce the growth factor, but I’ve seen no evidence of anything that reduces this below an exponential scenario. Over large scales, exponentials can be reasonably modeled by a piecewise function that’s 0 below some threshold and infinity above it (1). That translates roughly into a fixed number of options that can be maintained, modulated by your development practices. Without knowing what that limit actually is, what’s the best strategy for spending this limited resource? As there’s no such thing as an average person (2), I contend that this budget should be reserved for things that materially affect accessibility. (1) This is the standard approximation for a diode’s I-V curve, for instance (2) https://apps.dtic.mil/dtic/tr/fulltext/u2/010203.pdf https://apps.dtic.mil/dtic/tr/fulltext/u2/010203.pdf