translation: rewrites hurt, a lot<p>see this from 2000 : 
Things You Should Never Do, Part I
<a href="http://www.joelonsoftware.com/articles/fog0000000069.html" rel="nofollow">http://www.joelonsoftware.com/articles/fog0000000069.html</a><p>They [Netscape] did it by making the single worst strategic mistake that any software company can make:<p>They decided to rewrite the code from scratch.