only code anyone will be touching in a museum in 800 years will be the good code. I hope they don't talk about what great craftsmen we all were because someone saw an original Fabrice Bellard at the Louvre.
Survivor bias plays a role in glorifying the past.
You're right in that we kept the best examples (as coding museums will do in the future) but the best of something is a benchmark. It is striking that modern automation, even hundreds of years later, can't touch what a skilled craftsman could do in the past.
With programming, we documented a lot of it, so it's unlikely to go the way of fine weaving. People will always be able to learn to think and be great programmers.
Maybe if the wool weavers had internet, they could have blogged, made youtube videos, and cataloged their profession so it could last Millenia.
Agreed, I think the good gained by wool mills is greater in that little Timmy is less likely to lose a leg to frostbite than the bad loss of my scarf not passing through a ring.
Long term though, I’ve always wondered if the Amish turn out to be the only survivors.