It’s certainly one indicator of adoption trends. However, it can also be a worthless signal.
Imagine a no-code platform was so good that it needed no third-party integration support. Or, that by design, it eliminated the need to use other solutions to make the primary solution functional? There would be no evidence of the platform in these integration glue factories, and you might dismiss it as a viable platform.
This is partly why disruption often takes us by surprise. It sneaks up on us because it’s unlike everything we’ve come to assume is required.
You may have noticed my occasional surveying of developers here in TableForums and elsewhere as I problem for sentiment concerning Airtable aftermarket tools. The questions typically go like this -
If Airtable was able to magically do “x” internally, would you still use Make to address this requirement?
Many respondents say - I would not want to put all my eggs in the Airtable basket, so I would continue to use Make. This is irrational, of course, and when pressed, these respondents change their views. Make and other integration adhesives exist because the core product(s) are incapable of performing what Make provides. These tools provide roads where no roads previously existed. But what if you didn’t need a road in the first place?
In my view, properly vetting a platform requires a number of data points. The absence of activity is interesting, but it may also be misleading.
