I've always called this the "guy in the basement" effect. In the beginning, the guy in the basement would have an awesome idea for a library. He would spend 27

I've always called this the "guy in the basement" effect. In the beginning, the guy in the basement would have an awesome idea for a library. He would spend 27 hours a designing it, coding it, testing it, and making it awesome. The "guy in the basement" moves out because his partner wants to spend time with him. They start to live lives outside of the world of maintaining open source libraries. The partner asks, "Are you getting paid for all of this?" and the guy says, "No. It's open source. It's a good thing." but in saying it out loud to his partner, his priorities shift. Over the next year, the library deteriorates. It gets forked, other people ask to maintain it, he relents, but no single person has the vision. The library becomes a mish mash of priorities and no longer has the awesome cohesion it once had. Everyone using the library is very sad. Some are angry. An awesome replacement appears from another guy in the basement. The cycle repeats.