I think the CEO stepped in and made a judgement that the customer was not going to be worth it. I'm not saying the call was the right one.

Everyone here seems to think I believe the CEO acted perfectly correctly and that I'm defending him. I don't, and I'm not. I'm saying both parties come out of this looking bad, but I can at least understand the CEOs actions, and even if I don't actually approve of them, I have some sympathy.

BTW: I suspect we are not far apart here, the difference might be in the nuance. We both believe the termination without warning was petty, we both believe that there are such things as "bad" customers and "toxic" customers. We both believe that both parties behaved badly. The question is whether either or both deserve any sympathy.

But more importantly ... what lessons should we take from this?

* As a customer?

* As a provider?

I see. I think your comment which includes "and then I have, on occasion, refunded people, returned their data, and terminated their service." makes it seem like you have acted the same way as Ghosts CEO did here, terminating the service without asking if that's what the user wants before, and you were fine with acting in that way, but seems I misunderstood you.

I have personally no interest in figuring out if anyone deserves sympathy here, I simply want to make sure that other founders and CEOs reading HN don't believe that terminating someones service willy nilly is perfectly fine, because complaining once on Twitter makes you a "toxic" user.

Customers who immediately try to raise a mob on social media whenever they encounter the slightest issue are toxic customers, there's no way around it. There should be a list of such customers for companies to filter them out of their business when possible, ideally at signup. I know multiple small companies that would gladly pay for this service. Market for a new startup?

Blame all the big corporations who provide minimal customer service through anything except getting their attention on Twitter.