No question, but I just want to sympathize with your distress over receiving the original email. It's impossible to say for sure because I didn't receive one, but I think I would have reacted the same way. I am also very frustrated on your behalf with the way people in these comments are talking about you and others who read this email as a legal threat.

It's telling about many HN users' capacity for empathy that they think their reaction, real or hypothetical, has anything to do with whether this was a bad thing. Regardless of how any of us would react, it's clear from the many people who lawyered up or experienced anxiety because of the emails that this study had victims. Not seeing them as victims because you would have disregarded the email reveals what I'd consider a solipsistic mindset that causes them to regard others' experiences as less valid than their own.

Hey Xena, I’m glad your post is getting seen, too. I’m dismayed at how many people seem unable to imagine why you and I freaked out when we got letters from someone who sounded like they were a professional litigant. I’m glad to see the researchers, lawyers, and such talking about the ethical implications.

This is a messed up situation, but it’s comforting to know I’m not alone in it (although I wish for your sake that you weren’t involved).