alt Hacker NewsCode quality never really mattered to users of the software. You can have the most <whatever metric you care about> code and still have zero users or have high user frustration from users that you do have.
Code quality only matters in maintainability to developers. IMO it's a very subjective metric
It's not subjective at all. It's not art.
Code quality = less bugs long term.
Code quality = faster iteration and easier maintenance.
If things are bad enough it becomes borderline impossible to add features.
Users absolutely care about these things.