At the time, Kbin’s API was largely unfinished, meaning that technically, no Kbin instances supported apps of any kind.
Lack of a formal API to work with was tricky. There were discussions in Kbin’s development tracker about formally merging in support for apps, but it wasn’t ready for prime-time. Typically, adding a client API that’s well-rounded enough for mobile apps necessitates a lengthy checklist for requirements. Long story short, it’s a time-consuming process.
Some of the work she did – having to drive the thing off scraping the UI, without using a kbin API – is probably effectively being obsoleted, since kbin’s API stuff is coming out now:
I would say it’s more a cautionary tale about how people’s health is often far more important than anything we do in daily life. This focus on deliveries over life is quite worrying
Case and point? If they’re not being compensated, they have no obligations to anyone. “Free testing” isn’t compensation unless they plan to monetize it later using improvements from that testing.
Oh, legally they have no obligations unless written so in a binding contract. Ever seen a failed Kickstarter or a cancelled Patreon? No obligations, even if they get compensated in USD. Plenty of those out there.
Morally, the people giving that free testing and community building are still owed what they were promised, no less no more.
Okay, but there’s a line here somewhere. Pushing for new features and complaining in the issue tracker that a bug hasn’t been fixed soon enough is absolutely entitlement. Expecting someone to follow through on their word and release the source code is another thing entirely. Especially if they make the decision to stop working on it.
Go check out this EoL statement from the developer of Nomie. He open-sourced the code without even being asked too.
From a business perspective, that would be the case, also a cautionary tale about running a solo business.
However, the article says they planned to release the source, and had already managed to get a community of over 1000 people interested in the project, so I think the community perspective is more applicable.
Why was there even pressure to deliver if the official API wasn't even out yet? I thought they were just working on UI and basic functionality until they can plug in the API, so if anything they had more time and leisure than if everyone were screaming "i need it now". It seems more likely they just bit more than they could chew and decided to give up the app development since it ended up being harder than they thought (and that's completely fine to do). You don't really make an app like this overnight, especially if you have no prior experience doing it.
Case in point, Ernest had to take a month off kbin development to handle things in his personal life. I, too, have abandoned open source projects due to lack of interest. I think people incorrectly assume that the internet offers a level of permanence unmatched by real life, when in fact it only highlights the ethereal nature of anything people build.
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