[codezero]

Airplane was a startup in a competitive market, it wasn't Google Reader shutting down. Anyone using it was an early adopter and in my experience, most early adopters understand the risk. Maybe it's possible that folks will be hesitant, but after multiple successful exits, maybe that's a hypothetical that won't matter any more, often founders move on to be advisors/board members, and I think any board would be lucky to have Ravi's experience on tap.

[Rapzid]

Such a founder perspective.

Here is another; they fucked over their customers. Didn't even open source it on the way out?! Nobody with a memory for this is going use their products without second thought in the future.

But peoples memories are short and a sucker is born every day.

Would a board be lucky to have Ravi on it? Sure, maybe. So their personal success is secured fuck their users; slow clap.

[codezero]

I'm an airplane user, and have already moved our tooling over to retool. Fuck over their customers? I'm sorry, but you have a choice in what tools you acquire, buy, and invest in, if you don't take into account that the company is small, new, and requires VC funding to exist, I just can't empathize with you if you are angry about it not working out. I use new software because it usually gives me access to the team in a way that lets me build with them and get features that a larger incumbent won't provide, but that doesn't mean it will make the company successful, and if they fail it sucks, but it's not like they are actively trying to hurt me.

There are so many reasons it's not easy or straight forward to open source the software of a startup that failed. I don't know what to tell you, I guess since I've only worked for startups I kind of understand what risks are involved when working with them, but there are also benefits, it's a trade off that you should be making when you're informed.

If you want stability, buy from a profitable and stable company that can pen multi-year contracts that include liability clauses, and if your company has the leverage, get source code/on prem written into your MSA.

All that said: please, don't use new software or tools, avoid startups and steer clear of emerging technology, you'll feel less betrayed.

*I'm not a founder, never have been a founder, and never could be a founder.

[Rapzid]

> Fuck over their customers?

Yeah, I'm sorry you can't see that.

> There are so many reasons it's not easy or straight forward to open source the software of a startup that failed

I'm guessing zero effort was made to continue service for existing customers. If there were efforts made that failed, they would have mentioned it for PR.

> All that said: please, don't use new software or tools, avoid startups and steer clear of emerging technology, you'll feel less betrayed.

Doesn't change what happened.

> *I'm not a founder, never have been a founder, and never could be a founder.

Apparently you don't need to be to have a founder perspective.

[codezero]

> Yeah, I'm sorry you can't see that.

"Fuck over" to me implies malicious intent, if it doesn't to you then that may explain why we have differing points of view.

> Apparently you don't need to be to have a founder perspective.

How many startup founders have you worked closely with in your career when the company they ran was < 50 employees?

[theturtletalks]

Early on, my business relied heavily on Zapier in 2015 and they were just as big as Airplane at that point. If they sold the company and shut it down, I would swear never to do business with the parent company again. Yes I could migrate to something else or just code it if that were to happen, but that is a fuck over.

[Rapzid]

This is a bit late but yes, I believe you can "fuck over" people with a number of motivations that aren't necessarily "malicious".

For example I may be in a life boat with 5 other people and instead of adhering to rations I eat all the food or drink all the water. Because I can't control myself, I lack empathy, or I'm just incredible self-centered. Whatever the motivations I think many may describe what I did as "fucking over" everybody else.

[20after4]

Indifference can be malicious. Or at least it would qualify for fucking over the customers IMO. At least give them (and the employees) a bit more warning.

[kinj28]

I suggest think bootstrapped alternatives. (Disclaimer we are one of them )