Sorry to hear that. Pretty ridiculous behavior on their end given their own product isn't even that novel and innovative. Plenty of products start out as a copy of something else, and build out from there. Also, "We aren't going to argue with you on this point.". How old are we, 12?
i'm not convinced the OP is without blame and just tries to shove it onto them. "Also, "We aren't going to argue with you on this point.". How old are we, 12?" i could argue that a 12 year old loves to argue about how unfair things are and how his demands have to be met. I'm with whoever wrote this part. He saves everyone time by outright saying that there is no point in it. That's a more mature thing to do, actually…
Yes, you're always at the mercy of the platform holder and in the end they can do with it whatever they want, and maybe I'm old school on this, but giving your word on something still means something to me.
If someone tells me they will do X (in business) and they don't end up honoring said deal due to unreasonable behavior then I will refuse to do business with them in the future. And I will let people know who ask me about it.
Maybe it's something cultural since I'm not American, but I've noticed US companies to often act like this in various situations. Many, frankly, do not care about relationships.
I find this whole thing as appaling as the recent interaction that I've had with a company where we integrated their complete free API, and once the app we integrated it in started getting proper traction, they wanted us to pay for it ("collaborate more closely"). In this example they clearly advertise it as a free API but will threaten to shut access off if you don't pay.
Obviously we're promptly removing everything from our app + they're losing DAUs (which are also important to them) because of it.