And we are lucky that with software we have the flexibility to rebuild without many of the costs other disciplines face. If I want to rebuild a skyscraper in its same location for the same purpose, I can't build it offsite and then quickly publish it to the building site. I also don't get to reuse any of the cement or girders I used to build it the first time. Additionally, I can't easily redesign a skyscraper to support a totally new use case while not impacting existing tenants and the way the use the building.
People say this, and it certainly seems true on it's face --but software change is still without a doubt one of the most expensive parts of software development, and in fact we engineers spend a lot of time trying to learn how to design software to support change and how to make changes reliably.
To bring it back to the OP, redis is notable for being developed _very carefully and slowly and intentionally_, compared to much software. You won't get a feature in as quickly as you might want, but redis is comparatively rock-solid and backwards-compatibility-reliable software. These things are related. It takes time and effort and skill to make software that can change in backwards compat and reliable ways, takes lots of concern for writing it carefully in the first place.
Change of software is _not_ in fact easy. It might be easier than a bridge. But of course people just _don't change_ bridges, generally. We understand much better how to make requirements for a bridge that won't need to be changed for decades. Software might be easier to change than a bridge, but dealing with change is nonetheless without a doubt the most expensive and hardest part of producing software that will be used over a long term, and quality software is not cheap. And we haven't learned (and some think it may not be feasible ever) to make software that can last as a long as a bridge without changes.
