Not suprising that they would not want a 3rd party over who they had no control redistributing their data. Once the application gets widespread use beyond the programmers personal friends, it becomes associated with the airline. Any failures or problems with the application also get associated, rightly or wrongly, with the airline. Their execution obviously left something to be desired, if I was them I would have hired the OP as a contractor since he obviously has talent and innovative ideas, but their right to ask him to shut down is well justified.