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guilt

so i've been working on a project for 2 years now. i, myself, have gained many skills from it. i've learned multiple programming languages and created a resource in the meantime which has generated in total about 15k (he doesn't know about it). so, on my end, i'm doing fine. he hasn't gained any skills from the project as he was more of a manager and didn't have to learn anything new.

but I want to leave the project, for a few reasons. including that we argue badly (bad environment), I personally have gained enough to leave the project (selfish, i know), project will be released in a dying market with no growth and little proof of concept. so basically, there's many reasons why I'm ready to totally drop this and move on to better things.

the project was going to be released this year. i feel totally guilty because I've gained loads over the 2 years, made lots of money myself and I'm ready to move on. but I want to leave due to lack of passion, and I can't code when I'm not passionate about it. so basically I just feel really guilty about leaving because there's a lot left to get done that he would have to pay LOADS to get done commercially (i.e. i won't be doing it for free).

sorry this was a total ramble thread. I just feel guilty and need opinions. thanks people.
Reply 1
bmup
I think we need a bit more details. Is the other person just a stranger. Did both of you come up with the idea or was this something he employs you for. How did you make money if you were doing it for free? What kind of a project is it?
Reply 3
Original post by Carolina K.
I think we need a bit more details. Is the other person just a stranger. Did both of you come up with the idea or was this something he employs you for. How did you make money if you were doing it for free? What kind of a project is it?

1) known them for years, online voice based. never met
2) my idea firstly. but after the 2 years its become a shared project really
3) the money I made was completely outside of the project. I took my programming skills and made good money for myself. he didn't know. was just showing that I earned something out of the project if it just ended but they didnt
4) project is essentially an addon for a huge game.
Original post by Anonymous
1) known them for years, online voice based. never met
2) my idea firstly. but after the 2 years its become a shared project really
3) the money I made was completely outside of the project. I took my programming skills and made good money for myself. he didn't know. was just showing that I earned something out of the project if it just ended but they didnt
4) project is essentially an addon for a huge game.


Yeah, since this way your idea and you know the guy and involved him in it any consequences would be mostly your fault. You should talk it over with him and make sure that you didn't affect him much. The less effort and work he placed into it the better. To tell the truth, if one of my friends did that to me then I wouldn't even talk with them anymore since that is kind of a **** move. Sorry dude but I was hoping that you were strangers and this was just his idea he got you involved in. In that case this would be a bit sad for him but perfectly ok on your side,
Original post by Anonymous
1) known them for years, online voice based. never met
2) my idea firstly. but after the 2 years its become a shared project really
3) the money I made was completely outside of the project. I took my programming skills and made good money for myself. he didn't know. was just showing that I earned something out of the project if it just ended but they didnt
4) project is essentially an addon for a huge game.

So, the way that I'm reading this..

The money you earned working for yourself has nothing to do with him or anything he has been involved with

You put a lot of your own time and effort into teaching yourself a bunch of skills

You put a lot of work into a project, but that seems irrelevant since it sounds like it has no intrinsic financial value to anybody anyway.

He involved himself in the project but didn't take the opportunity to teach himself anything.

You aren't happy carrying on working with him, but seem to be fine going off on your own

You don't seem to owe him anything

You don't seem to be taking anything away from him


What is the problem exactly?

As for the project itself, it sounds like you're just passing it to him so it's really up to him what he decides to do with it. He could teach himself all the same things you've done and pick up where you left off. Of course it would take him longer, but it seems entirely plausible. Or he could open source the project, or find someone else online to start work on it, maybe just abandon it. Projects frequently end up being cancelled or change for all kinds of reasons - it's not at all unusual to put a lot of effort into something which is never finished after the original stakeholders change their mind about it. All projects carry the risk of being dropped before they're complete.
(edited 5 years ago)

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