of course they're wasting their time. a year of work deleted? all you have to show for it is money? you could have money AND something to be proud of. what a waste it was, to do something pointless for a year when you could have done something important.
not to say that there aren't experiments worth running. but in my experience (and in the example in the OP's article), the experiment often isn't even worth running. Intelligent people knew from the jump that it was a bad idea. No experiment necessary. Just pointless waste, enabled by hubris and apathy.
It seems different people get different things out of work. My favorite kind of code to write at work is code that I know will never make it to production. No chance of requirement change or incomprehensible support tickets. I mean your way is valid too.
ah, to be clear, I'm not really talking about anyone's individual values here. It may well be that a person is as rewarded, or even moreso, getting to work on some pie-in-the-sky foolish idea as they are one that is productive for society.
My point is that, from the viewpoint of an external observer: we want people doing prosocial work if it's possible, so if there's counterfactuals where they do or don't, we'd rather they do. And the point of taking moral stances on stuff is to press for the attitudes and behaviors that lead to a world that maximize's everyone's safety and happiness and prosperity and whatnot. Therefore it is moral, at some level: a world where the company wastes money on dumb stuff is worse than a world where the company channels that money into value for humanity.
It has nothing to do with the individual's preferences, and I don't begrudge them their preferences either way. My point is that when we're evaluating "letting projects fail" as a policy, the moral angle needs to be part of the conversation, because it does have moral implications. Convincing yourself that it does not is a moral choice: it amounts to saying that you do not feel responsible for those implications in the slightest. That doesn't mean you should turn around and be fully responsible for them, either. As with anything there is a lot to weigh. But completely writing it off seems wrong.
not to say that there aren't experiments worth running. but in my experience (and in the example in the OP's article), the experiment often isn't even worth running. Intelligent people knew from the jump that it was a bad idea. No experiment necessary. Just pointless waste, enabled by hubris and apathy.