This proves that at the core. The things we rely on to achieve great software and life impacting technologies are extremely simple. The complexity is that how to make them.
The core concepts are generally very straightforward, however it's always the optimization that adds complexity. That's how you get the orders of magnitude improvement. This C89 core definitely doesn't do macro op fusion for instance.
By complexity, i meant the hardware it self. Not even the architecture or the instructions set. For example you can design a virtual machine in days. But making a real one is at the core of the geopolitical issues we have today
The complexity is in how to distribute dev workload and how to make it financially viable. No one pays for beautiful works of art unless it’s somehow anchored, tangled and aligned into their interests.