From what I've read so far in four years, the arrogance/humility problem is in no way exclusive to the project leaders, and I think it comes from the overall agressive tone that has been common here, particularly in this thread.

I'm not going to try understanding which one of the egg or the hen came first, but I do understand that people from both sides end up irritated - after all they all sunk either lots of money and hopes, or lots of sweat and time - and ultimately feel obliged to answer like they have rabies. With all due respect Pichlo, while I usually appreciate your concise and well written messages, your post here shows exactly what it is complaining about.

This kind of conversations and oppositions between backers and project leaders is very likely to just be noxious over the longer term. I myself would not stand such critics (including personal critics, not just comments on the project itself) for a long time while dedicating much of my time in a project for backers without any guarantee that it will even work. I think our impatience kind of makes us forget how much the projects leaders are investing in the Neo900 compared to our pledges, even though our pledges should not be ignored either.

Maybe the project leaders need to consider apologizing for the lack of communication (even though we know they have no manpower for that, they also know the lack of news has always been seen as a huge problem in the Neo900 project and they could maybe just dedicate half a day every month to share updates in a news, even if the news is about lack of progress due to any issue), maybe. But maybe we should also consider being more respectful and not behave like these angry clients in a bar that know no better way than yelling or humiliating the bartender if they did not want ice cubes in their drink.

A community project is going nowhere if the community and the project leaders look at each others with hostility as if they are in trenches expecting the next assault. Let's kiss and dance the dance of joy.