4 ms·

> Charging for something monthly and then one month decide you want to do other things, is not a dick move. It most certainly is a dick move if you know you ha

> Charging for something monthly and then one month decide you want to do other things, is not a dick move. It most certainly is a dick move if you know you have customers who depend on the service. To avoid being a dick, provide your users more notice. > If you pay me to clean your apartment for two months but the third month I decide to do something else instead, do I have to keep cleaning your apartment? Of course you don't, but to avoid being a dick, provide adequate notice, with adequete being enough time to find a replacement. If I had a party on the 2nd day of month 3 with an expectation you'd be cleaning the apartment on day 1 only to be told on the 1st that you wouldn't be doing it, that would be a dick move. ------ Essentially it comes down to providing enough notice to find a replacement. The time needed to do that obviously depends on the service, but I can think of many cases where a months notice is less than acceptable.

diggan 11y ago
The service is a side project. It's something half baked (maybe not always half baked, but often) you did because you thought it was fun to do. If someone is depending on my side project, I'm not gonna take responsibility for you making a bad decision to depend on a service that people make as a side project. Of course, if we're talking "real" projects/services, it's different. But now we're talking about side projects. Something you do on the side. I'm not against letting your users know that you're shutting down with a good amount of time before. What I'm against is that someone saying (the linked blogpost for example) that I HAVE TO maintain my side project because someone decided to depend on it.
- thetmkay 11y ago
  It's a matter of communication and self-representation. You may think it's naive for someone to rely on your side project, but from their perspective they may never have known it was a side project. It may just look like a normal legitimate paid service, with a reasonable expectation of duty of care. A consequence of the plethora of great dev tools/services out there is that it's relatively easy to produce a professional looking website, and thus increasingly difficult to tell whether said site represents a business or a side project (especially with wannabe start-ups, who commonly promote and advertise MVP services with landing pages only to pivot soon after). There should be some accountability for properly 'cleaning up/closing up' a business. I don't think the OP said anything about having to maintain in perpetuity - just that there is an implicit social contract (and sometimes legal) to clean up a side project with due care when you take money. In an ideal world, there would always be some care - but realistically speaking, the most appropriate line in the sand is paid/free.
- s73v3r 11y ago
  Nobody gives a shit that it's a "side project". They paid good money to you for it. If it really was half baked, then why the fuck are you taking money for it in the first place. "I'm not against letting your users know that you're shutting down with a good amount of time before. What I'm against is that someone saying (the linked blogpost for example) that I HAVE TO maintain my side project because someone decided to depend on it." No. It stopped being a side project, and became a real project the second you started taking money for it.

diggan 11y ago

The service is a side project. It's something half baked (maybe not always half baked, but often) you did because you thought it was fun to do. If someone is depending on my side project, I'm not gonna take responsibility for you making a bad decision to depend on a service that people make as a side project. Of course, if we're talking "real" projects/services, it's different. But now we're talking about side projects. Something you do on the side. I'm not against letting your users know that you're shutting down with a good amount of time before. What I'm against is that someone saying (the linked blogpost for example) that I HAVE TO maintain my side project because someone decided to depend on it.

thetmkay 11y ago
It's a matter of communication and self-representation. You may think it's naive for someone to rely on your side project, but from their perspective they may never have known it was a side project. It may just look like a normal legitimate paid service, with a reasonable expectation of duty of care. A consequence of the plethora of great dev tools/services out there is that it's relatively easy to produce a professional looking website, and thus increasingly difficult to tell whether said site represents a business or a side project (especially with wannabe start-ups, who commonly promote and advertise MVP services with landing pages only to pivot soon after). There should be some accountability for properly 'cleaning up/closing up' a business. I don't think the OP said anything about having to maintain in perpetuity - just that there is an implicit social contract (and sometimes legal) to clean up a side project with due care when you take money. In an ideal world, there would always be some care - but realistically speaking, the most appropriate line in the sand is paid/free.
s73v3r 11y ago
Nobody gives a shit that it's a "side project". They paid good money to you for it. If it really was half baked, then why the fuck are you taking money for it in the first place. "I'm not against letting your users know that you're shutting down with a good amount of time before. What I'm against is that someone saying (the linked blogpost for example) that I HAVE TO maintain my side project because someone decided to depend on it." No. It stopped being a side project, and became a real project the second you started taking money for it.