Second-system effect

The second-system effect (also second-system syndrome) is the tendency for a successful first system (often small and relatively elegant) to be followed by a second system that becomes over-engineered or bloated. The effect is commonly attributed to increased confidence after the first success and to accumulated ideas that were deferred from the first system and then added en masse to the second.

Brooks introduced the phrase in The Mythical Man-Month (1975) while describing IBM's transition from relatively simple operating systems for the IBM 700/7000 series to the much more ambitious OS/360 for the IBM System/360 family (announced in 1964).

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