This is where statically typed code bases really shine IMHO. I've seen >10 year old Java code bases that are maintainable because of all the automated re-factoring that can be done to clean up naming inconsistencies and deprecate various mistakes. With dynamic languages cruft and little mistakes just keep building up till people give up trying to maintain it and want to start over.

There is another force at work here... If you do achieve a "clean simple X" and manage to resist over time all temptation to add cruft; if your "X" really is clean simple and above all found useful by some people, then after a while it starts to look like a dead project. No new "features". Not many bugs left to fix that bother people. Sufficient means to plug in additional/variant functionality that real users need. No need to change the codebase, and not much more to say about it. So to a non-user - perhaps evaluating it with a view to use - it looks very much like a moribund piece of work.

The continual adding of cruft is (partially, at least) driven by a need to be seen adding new Hot Sauce all the time.