[dansanderson]

Avoiding names is polite and professional because there is potential for doubt in any situation, and one report by an injured party can inflate or distort the truth. This is hard to see when you are the injured party, but that's why these are social norms, to give guidance for appropriate behavior in emotionally charged situations.

One of the benefits of there being a company involved is the company can take responsibility for the imperfect acts of its employees. Blaming a bad author experience on a publisher is entirely appropriate. Connecting the names of individuals to a disgruntled report in the public record is usually not.

Disclaimer: I'm a satisfied O'Reilly author. I'm considering self-publishing for my next project, but not because of my experiences with a publisher. For my (non-design-oriented) tech book, O'Reilly did far better by me than other major publishers did by other authors I know.