>> There's no point in shipping

There is a lot of point in shipping, and as somebody else pointed out that something made in 2 hours can also be shipped.

What shipping has taught me is to really really restrict the scope, the un-essentials. That in turn has helped in my day job as well, to negotiate correctly on milestones, feature scope etc helping me in staying sane and productive!

>> strangers things that they want you to give them

I don't know if you mean OSS users by this but if yes, then where are these users pestering the authors to give them something, they just lap it up if it is useful when the author gives it to them.