They are different situations. Here we're talking about an author who presumably has had a good relationship with a publisher for years, versus a situation like GoDaddy where customer relationships are almost entirely impersonal (and automated).

Despite the metaphors we use sometimes, businesses are not entirely machines. Writing a letter in the first place implies you're attempting to reach a human being who can do something about it. With GoDaddy, writing letters barely even makes sense. They presumably changed because people actually started moving their domains, not because they wrote letters threatening to do so.