Firing Bad Customers: From Freedom to Termination
Joshua “Null” Moon wondered how a company that had signed a legally binding contract with his platform, Kiwi Farms, could suddenly cease all services. The email from Cloudflare announced it would no longer protect Kiwi Farms from cyber threats. Kiwi Farms began as a Wiki site for expressing opinions about notable internet personalities. The site grew into a full-fledged forum known as CWCKi. In 2015, the forum was re-branded to Kiwi Farms. The forum evolved into a venue for those opposing views of queer and neurodivergent people online. Cloudflare served Kiwi Farms by providing security features that protected against cyber threats. Without Cloudflare or a substitute service provider, Kiwi Farms would not be able to operate. In August 2022, a campaign began to push Cloudflare to fire Kiwi Farms as a customer. Cloudflare CEO Matthew Prince decided that firing Kiwi Farms was necessary because content posted on the site posed an immediate threat to human life. Prince’s decision didn’t answer Moon’s question: how could Cloudflare break their contract?
In completing this assignment, students should be able to:
1. Explain the concept of freedom of expression and its limits.
2. Evaluate the strength of a First Amendment argument against a company that terminates a service contract/fires a customer.
3. Identify and analyze the competing interests a business must consider when deciding whether to fire a customer