The story reminded me of how some small game developers end up making stupid decisions simply because there wasn't a person in the "company" with the skills to handle the situation properly.
At first I assumed that there wasn't much in that analogy, but wow after having read up I also see that it's a very similar situation. The company here was a kickstarter with very few employees involved, with the product largely made elsewhere on contract. The boss didn't know what he was doing when a customer left an unpleasant review. Perhaps he's never dealt with customers in his previous career, and the company will now suffer from that.
Why a garage door opener needs to connect over the untrusted internet to a server somewhere is beyond me, but I can open my garage a good 30 yards away via RF
Overworked devop engineer knows code inside out and how the overall system architecture works... and KNOWS it works. In fact, disgruntled devop engineer knows the system inside and out so well he knows how to cut your shit off, not because he's an ahole but because he's a beast of a devops engineer.
So, already edgy devop engineer reads a total regular can't set up his system, which he knows is solid and made it easy enough for a regular to set up, which we all know is a major pita.
Regular gets upset, probably not the sharpest knife in the kitchen counter, and whines about it. Devop engineer knows he's dealing with a total jag off and to show how tight of a system they run shows the regular who's boss.
Totallllllly shady move by dev ops man, but really... should regulars even have access to all this awesome stuff that crazy smart people built? So, they can turn around and complain how it's not totally idiot proof? I for one am tired of dumbing the shit down.