Ask HN: PR and Project Post Mortems?

I am interested in hearing personal experiences with deciding to end a project. How did other people react to the news? How did that make you feel? What did you do? What do you think you should have done differently?

I am getting pity emails, like people think I am ending my project for emotional reasons. This seems to be a pretty standard reaction to me personally, one which both baffles and offends me. I routinely inspire the "gosh, I feel so sorry for you" type reaction. It is usually not accompanied by any genuine attempt to be helpful. It is generally delivered in the most insulting way possible, like any personal problem I have ever had is evidence of stupidity and incompetence on my part, which is not remotely true.

Further, people who valued the information I was trying to share so little that they could not remember the url and had to ask me for it are announcing how cherished my wisdom is and they want to copy it while it is still available. I know this is actually pretty standard human behavior. If you announce something is banned, being discontinued, or otherwise of very limited availability, people who never had any interest will suddenly want it. I have had a class on social psychology. I know this is a well studied, well established phenomenon. But it is really making me grumpy.

So I am trying to figure out what to do that is more constructive than giving a piece of my mind to some total stranger who has sent me a pity party email. I have other reasons to be grumpy this morning, on top of this. So my usual objectivity and relative aplomb are escaping me.

I am hoping someone else who has been through something similar can clue me.

Thanks.