Hey dalton, I've posted my thoughts in this thread, and I'm also considering writing a blog article about this, but I have one meta thing to share with you.
This letter doesn't make two things clear to me: 1) what exactly it is you're upset about and 2) what you think should have happened. Because of this, people in this thread are making a lot of assumptions which are uncharitable and inaccurate, and you come across as looking more naive than I suspect you actually are.
Clarifying in the thread is good, but it's damage control. I'm not sure if you wrote the letter when you were angry, or if it was originally written to people with more context, but I just wanted to share a part of why I think this thread is going the way it is.
1) I am unhappy that I wasted my time and energy building on a platform that encouraged me to do so, and within the matter of months changed their mind. This is the same thing that makes me unhappy with what Twitter is doing to their ecosystem: http://daltoncaldwell.com/what-twitter-could-have-been
2) Once Mark Zuckerberg gave personal blessing, he shouldn't have changed his mind. I have an interesting email thread along these lines.
It's a game to them. Don't initiate games with children if you don't want to be involved where childish things can be done. Children can do nasty things. They don't understand or possibly don't care of the consequences. Their goal is to create and maintain a controlled ecosystem. They know legally where they stand and they have billions of dollars now to drag out any lawsuit, if anyone decides to waste their energy on such a thing. I am sure they feel invincible, and I can understand how that could develop with what they have power of / are in control of.
I recently had an issue with a local group of 'investors' / tech people, and after learning more details I was clearly mislead into presenting to them.. What they were looking to invest in was absolutely not a match to what I am doing. Sure, it was under confidential and private settings, though I know I taught them a lot and exposed a lot I rather would not have - simply because I don't think these people have good intentions or are honest people - and I don't want to support that as a human being, because I don't think that's good for society.
>I am unhappy that I wasted my time and energy building on a platform that encouraged me to do so, and within the matter of months changed their mind.
I am no fan of facebook, but it seems like they offered to compensate you for your time. In fact, it seems like that entire meeting was designed to demonstrate to them that you'd actually built something that worked so that they could buy you off.
They didn't have to do that, they could have just squashed you. In the end, I think you should have taken their offer (perhaps all in cash and then leave ASAP , as someone else suggested) and then built something else.
The key point here is that you seem to value your autonomy, and a surprisingly few people on this board seem to see that. What I'm trying to say is that there was a way for you to exit a situation that was going to deny your autonomy in such a way that it could set you up for the next thing. Who knows? Perhaps it's not too late for that.
But Dalton was it really such a surprise for you? Was it a first time you heard or had a felling that someone is building something cool and dataset owner wants to shut them down? Seriously, I have at least 50 different cool ideas taping into both Twitter and Facebook streams, but will never lose a minute on any of those because I know that the stream can be turned off any minute. If you ever read techcrunch, mash, sai, a vc etc, you would sooner or later stumble upon a similar situation. "Blessing" from Mark doesnt change a shit -- he doesnt answer to you, he answers to the board and stock owners and since IPO with this thing tanking 40% he is on a very tight leech and you are the last one to answer to.
You story also reminds me of a gentleman agreement I had with Don Dodge. His "blessing" and interest in my idea made me work days and nights to deliver asap, and at the end he totally backed out. It was painful and disappointing, but one cannot do nothing about it.
I guess that judgement depends upon the degree to which you receive credible assurances that you feel you can rely on. You have been bitten by Don Dodge and are now twice shy. Doubtless DC will be doubly cautious in the future. I am sure he is trying to warn others to do likewise.
How much elapsed time would make it OK? 6 months? a year? 10 years? Expecting a large company to know where it's going a year in advance and reveal it to outside devs seems unreasonable, even for pure platforms.
If you can't provide any stability and predictability for outside devs you shouldn't represent yourself as a platform. It's ridiculous to pretend othewise. A platform HAS TO BE STABLE. It HAS TO OFFER TRUST.
This letter doesn't make two things clear to me: 1) what exactly it is you're upset about and 2) what you think should have happened. Because of this, people in this thread are making a lot of assumptions which are uncharitable and inaccurate, and you come across as looking more naive than I suspect you actually are.
Clarifying in the thread is good, but it's damage control. I'm not sure if you wrote the letter when you were angry, or if it was originally written to people with more context, but I just wanted to share a part of why I think this thread is going the way it is.