TLDR: I am upset that my customers are so stupid that they pay for something which was never meant to be a real product, while almost entirely ignoring the real product, which just happens to be a true labor of love. Therefore, I shall discontinue the thing that's bringing in more money, while also publicly talking about how little I think of my customers. I am smarter than them, and I like to rub this fact in their foolish faces.
I understand that there might be deep, philosophical implications here, with regard to the psychology of social gaming and whatnot, but throughout history, way before Facebook and the Internet, artists would frequently create "popular" art, even though they despised it, so that they could have the money to privately create the "real" art that they loved. It is not only rude, but a sign of poor character, for the artist to also despise the people who gladly pay him for what they perceive to have value. I don't know anything more about this guy than what I read in the above article, but HNers, given their tendency towards startups, should stand with his disappointed customers, and not with his lofty attitude. If someone paid me for the privilege of being able to click on the image of a cow more often than those who do not pay, I would try to figure out how to improve the experience for them, and/or how to charge them even more, all the while pocketing the money for some project that was important to me on an idealistic level. Making fun of your customers' intelligence, especially because they've simply made the choice to pay for your product, is never a good thing.
I understand that there might be deep, philosophical implications here, with regard to the psychology of social gaming and whatnot, but throughout history, way before Facebook and the Internet, artists would frequently create "popular" art, even though they despised it, so that they could have the money to privately create the "real" art that they loved. It is not only rude, but a sign of poor character, for the artist to also despise the people who gladly pay him for what they perceive to have value. I don't know anything more about this guy than what I read in the above article, but HNers, given their tendency towards startups, should stand with his disappointed customers, and not with his lofty attitude. If someone paid me for the privilege of being able to click on the image of a cow more often than those who do not pay, I would try to figure out how to improve the experience for them, and/or how to charge them even more, all the while pocketing the money for some project that was important to me on an idealistic level. Making fun of your customers' intelligence, especially because they've simply made the choice to pay for your product, is never a good thing.