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Not really a software anti-pattern, as it does not result in any particular software mechanism.

If anything, this is a development-process anti-pattern (not even software specific). Its also extremely obvious and non-specific so doubtful that its worth naming as an anti-pattern.

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If it's so extremely obvious, why does it happen time and time again? I think I've spent all of my time arguing against this process. It's bad. It's better to improve on a bad design, than to make a bad design worse by adding another design to it. But it's hard to notice that.

Because its extremely difficult to do something about it.

Its normal for people to change what they're working on, this is inevitable.

There is some benefit to naming common problems to help discuss them, but this name strikes me as too clever / not immediately clear enough. "Bit rot" is a somewhat similar phenomena with a much better name.

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