My account on Twitter has been suspended. I logged in and was informed of this by a banner across the top of the site. I have no idea why. I'm obviously not a malicious user.

Twitter's documentation claims that if you've been suspended you'll have received an email explaining why. I have received no such email. I appealed, and the appeal produced a rather paternalist automated response:

If you didn't receive an email indicating why your account was suspended, please take a minute to review the Twitter Rules. If you suspect you've been suspended for another reason, please reply to this email with a short explanation.

What?

Some Google searches pull up lots of people in the same circumstances - their accounts have been suspended and they have no idea why, they have received no email explanation and their appeals are never responded to either.

So I have no idea if I'll ever hear from Twitter again. One person who did hear back, heard back about a week later. Is that really the best they can do?

I've been using Twitter since 2008. I have over 400 followers and nearly 600 posts. I rely on Twitter as a way to communicate with other people. Obviously, that was a mistake.

What I've learned from this experience is that Twitter accounts can be suspended at any time, without explanation, and without a reliable appeal process.

In other words - relying on Twitter to communicate with people is probably not a good idea.