Wildbit already made the decision. It's already happening. They've been working on it for months and months. I don't think they care what random people on the internet have to say, either good or ill.

Why write, then? To draw back the curtain a little on their business, and no doubt also for some exposure. Which has totally worked for them.

I am writing for the benefit of the other people reading, who would only otherwise see the "zomg waste!" responses and not understand where those reactions are coming from… e.g. a place verrry different from the place where the people live who made the decision. Unlike the vast majority of the commenters, my husband and I run a product business very much like Wildbit's, just a little bit younger. And we know them. So I want to challenge more HNers to think beyond the obvious, safe opinion ("they shouldn't have shut it down! money!") and understand what it's really like, what they're missing from their imagined scenario.

And with that said, I'd like to invite you to consider the meaning of "feedback." Is anyone ever excited to get "feedback"? Do people do things, and write, in order to "get feedback"? That is a rather sad, limited view of human endeavor.

HN is a kind of echo chamber, with most people expressing the same (tired, accepted, safe) opinions & receiving plaudits and upvotes in return. That sounds more like the second definition of "feedback" to me -- the return of a fraction of the output signal.