Ask HN: What is the thing you've built that you regret the most?

I'm a bit late but just had this recommended to me by someone who knows what happened to me.

I set up a startup with an acquaintance (also the life partner of an ex colleague and now former friend). We were equal partners: I did the tech, they did the marketing/strategy and occasional bit of UI design.

We got pre-seed investment with a 7-figure valuation, and we were doing the standard startup thing: building features, looking for product market fit. We had a good working relationship, with zero arguments and barely a disagreement.

Then, my one-year-old son was suddenly taken seriously ill with a life-changing condition. There was a horrible period where we weren't sure if he was going to live or die. To add to this, my wife was also 6 months pregnant at the time.

My son had some very serious operations, and required a long time to recover. The operations didn't go as planned, leaving him still with a life changing illness with a very dim outlook.

Obviously, as soon as this happened I told my partner, and they told me they would take care of everything and to take the time we needed. Everything was set up to run without intervention, and for marginal cost, so I things could be on hold without really affecting our runway.

There were some accounts we had set up with 3rd parties where I was the account admin so I transferred these over when my partner asked me to. I did this outside the paediatric intensive care unit where my son's life was in the balance.

After nearly two months of bad news after bad news, we finally made it home and began adapting to our new life.

I told my partner that I would be ready to begin returning to work gradually if possible. I got no reply.

After a few weeks, I finally got a response. My behaviour was apparently so bad that it put the company at risk, and I had been fired from my own company, with all my shares being transferred back with zero value.

Now, obviously this was absolute nonsense, and I had done nothing of the sort, so I phoned our investor to see if they knew anything. Apparently my partner had told a complete tissue of lies about how we'd been arguing and etc., etc. which was all 100% false.

Anyway, I immediately instructed the most expensive lawyer I could find who told me there was absolutely no way on earth they could lawfully do what they had done, so we began action for breach of contract.

It turned out ok for me in the end, but not after a lot of turmoil.

I absolutely cannot believe someone could be so evil, cruel and opportunistic. Basically, I'd built something that was a working, sellable product as is, requiring very little human intervention, and they decided to steal it off me.

I'm actually glad to be out of it, but I have to say getting into business with that person is a huge regret. Also, my ex-colleague who was her life partner obviously helped with figuring out what accounts and stuff they needed to take complete control of everything. I didn't think at the time what was going on when they were asking for owner access to everything. It did strike me as slightly odd but I trusted them.

As bad as it was, I've learned a lot from it: 1. Don't go into business with people you don't know really, really well. 2. Some seemingly nice people can be utter, utter shitbags for money. 3. It turns out that some people will literally completely make up stuff about you and tell it to other people. Things with not even a grain of truth. 4. Expensive lawyers are worth the money. 5. It feels good to win when someone does something shit to you like that. 6. Nothing matters more than family.

The marginal cost of union fees is trivial in comparison to a salary.

A union gives you more choices than "surveil or resign".

And if the union fails you because it says "no, you have to surveil" then you can still resign.

Australia. As a senior software developer, it's possible to earn a salary of up to $110K USD. That may sound OK until you consider that in Australia, an experienced coal miner earns $130K USD (7 days on, 7 days off lifestyle) and a garbage man earns $80K USD...

Also, many builders, plumbers and other tradesmen run their own businesses and are earning much more than average.

Because everyone else has high salaries, it drives house prices and living costs to insane levels.

It's a similar situation in most non-US countries through. It's even worse in Europe where software developers have to compete with people from developing countries (that was true even before the mass influx caused by Ukraine war) - They have it better because they can arbitrage the international cost of living differences to buy up cheap real estate in their home countries (which, as a non-citizen, I cannot do due to regulations).

I had actually relocated to EU (Germany) to try to improve my situation but was shocked to find out that things were even worse than in Australia due to higher immigration (more competition from countries with lower cost of living = lower salaries). It was so bad, I had to move back to Australia.

At least in Australia the class differences aren't so significant; being at the bottom of society doesn't feel as bad.

Pretty much. We laughed off the weed stuff but when we saw the .mp4 stuff we realized it got too far.

Imagine the world we could live in if there were no weapons. That's the world we would have if nobody built them.

I have heard the line "If I don't build it somebody else will." from an engineer working on multi-million dollar weapons (think F-16).

I can only decide what I do with my time on this earth. Everyone makes that decision for themselves.