Not that I regret it, but I found out that creating a community around an open source project is not like what you expect. I've been working on a tool for a very popular project for more than two years, adding features, refining it etc. since I had my time. Reading many comments on HN and Reddit on how people don't like current dominant tool or its alternatives, what features they expect etc. I thought I've got one that people would like to use.

I have open sourced it and shared it on a few places and got zero traction. Ok, I thought, I can talk about it here and there, so it would get more visibility. People don't like it much since I'm promoting my own tool. I posted a blog post about some technique on tool's website and people seemed to like it on Reddit. A few people wrote comments like "interesting" or "amazing" and I was happy for the first time. Then someone wrote that you should not make your friends/alt-accounts comment on your posts, it's cringe and that happiness went away.

I've been a lurker on social media nearly whole my life. Putting myself out there feels like an unpleasant experience. I'm still deciding whether to continue or just go back to lurking and keep my tool to myself.