There's this weird pressure wave of change. Energy diffuse where change can occur, when resistance is too strong, other things will change, if nothing can change structural / qualitative rearrangement are tried. Otherwise it's coma or death.
> Some [software components] don't care about users at all but are good at being preinstalled on hardware.
Windows, anyone?
Anyway, one interesting aspect here is that software is able to reproduce even if it is not being executed. Which sounds weird. However, have a look at transposons: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Transposable_element
This seems to blur the border between virally-spread cute kitten photos and software.
> "Well-designed components are easy to replace. Eventually, they will be replaced by ones that are not so easy to replace."
This explains so much.