I had a colony for a short time between the feature being released and the maintenance this week. I got Iron every 6 hours (not much to be fair, and not enough to make the cost of taking it worthwhile but that's a different thread). Anyhow, every six hours the colony would pump some iron out into a bucket. I could come along at any time and collect what was in that bucket. If there were two cycles then I'd get two lots of iron, and so on. I took a new colony after the maintenance and now the collection is much less player-friendly. When the 6 hour cycle finishes, the next one doesn't start until I've collected the resources from the previous cycle. Before I could come to my island the next day, say 15 hours after I'd seen it last and there would be two lots of resources waiting to be collected and the island would be well into the cycle for the next one. Now, I go to my island and there's one to be collected and the next cycle begins at that point.
Why did this change? Why make the new feature even less useful at a time when there are already big questions about it's value?