> systemd, the project, isn't a binary. Its dozens of binaries. It can't have scope creep because that's impossible - they're literally dozens of separate things.

I suppose you don't understand (or are pretending not to understand) what "scope creep" means. Oh well.

> I also don't consider a dependency on dbus "scope creep".

I also don't consider a dependency on DBus scope creep. I consider making PID 1 crash whenever DBus needs to restart because of a upgrade/security fix/etc. in DBus or one of the libraries it links against to be a fantastically poor design decision.

> And sure, maybe OpenRC is just as simple as systemd...

It's far simpler. It concerns itself with bringing up and supervising services. It doesn't contain a DNS resolver, a (subtly buggy) Cron, a syslog daemon, and the many other things SystemD has decided to (whether correctly or incorrectly) reimplement.