To think most of you don’t know Mumsnet are now requiring acceptance of cookie tracking or payment to use the site?

[OldChairMan]

… as MN have only posted in Site Stuff:

https://www.mumsnet.com/talk/site_stuff/5268190-introducing-pay-or-consent-on-mumsnet?utm_campaign=thread&utm_medium=share

Many will click on “Read for free” without realising that this is a change in the site’s terms.

“Hello everyone.

We wanted to give you a heads-up about a change in the way we deal with cookie consent. We are introducing a Pay or Consent model, giving you two different options to continue accessing the site:

• Continue for free with cookies and ads: this is the option that most people have enabled already.
• Subscribe to Mumsnet Premium: For those who prefer an ad-free experience with no cookies/tracking for ad purposes - Besides ad-free you’ll also get first access to our product tests plus all revenues from Premium are put towards our campaigning work

Why are we making this change?

The pay or consent model is becoming increasingly common across online platforms as publishers adapt to changes in advertising levels and data privacy regulations. Like many other publishers, we relied on advertising to generate income but changes in tracking regulation and the growing use of ad blockers have made this model less viable.

We know that Mumsnet is an essential space for many - a place to seek advice, find support, and connect with your fellow Mumsnetters. That’s why we’re committed to ensuring that the site remains free at the point of use for anyone who needs it but it’s not fair that those who install ad blockers or rejected cookies are piggy backing on the back of other users who haven’t.

At the same time as introducing this, we’re going to reduce the price of Mumsnet Premium to £2.99 a month because we want to be fair to those who’d rather not accept advertising cookies. This is less than the cost of a flat white a month from most decent coffee shops and we very much hope you think Mumsnet’s worth it! Nb anyone who’s signed up to Mumsnet Premium already at the previous price (£4.99 per month) will have their payments reduced within the next week or so.

We’ll be here to answer any questions you may have. Thank you, as always, for supporting Mumsnet.”

Does this mean I'll need to delete my cookies after every single time I use the website now, if I can't reject the cookies and don't want to pay to subscribe? That's pants.

Exactly. Or maybe.. the premium option has paid staff moderating overnight and the free version has volunteers?? 😁

We don't 'work here for free', we are not 'product' either. We are consented contributors and that's it. Some posters seem to have some puffed-up delusions of their part to play in chatting on a chatboard.

The consent or pay box isn't new, I see it every time I log in.

"MN don't provide content. They host content which is provided for free by people who post on the site."

This!

Just download an adblocker - there are several good free use ones available.

There's some question over the legality of the model because the cookie legislation is supposed to give people the option to freely opt out of cookies without unnecessary hinderence, but it's unclear and a lot of places are going for it.

I have some sympathy but also individual subscriptions isn't a tenable model. I'm not going to pay £3 a month for every website I visit! It's getting silly.

And can we please have a moratorium on telling people that x isn't expensive it's just the price of a cup of coffee! It's extremely tired.

How do you install an ad blocker?! Can you recommend one?

And can we please have a moratorium on telling people that x isn't expensive it's just the price of a cup of coffee! It's extremely tired.

Can we add 'it's a business, don't use it if you don't like it' to the list?

We are not customers we are the product. We provide content which people come here to read in order for advertisers to advertise at them.
The customers are the companies who advertise on the site.

I'm certainly not posting links to adblockers here! Google is your friend, there's loads of them.

I use the brave browser on my tablet and my PC, there are no adverts and none of those fake threads which are really adverts.

No we are not the paying customers. What are you paying to consume?

We are the content creators (workers) as we are the ones participating in the chat forums. There would be no MN without users creating and participating in the threads.

Another role for us is we are the product. We users are the product as MN generates millions in revenue from ads being fed to us whilst we're here looking at and creating the OPs and threads.

So it's CF of the highest order to ask for money and then accuse anyone who doesn't subscribe as piggybacking freeloaders.

I agree that we're not customers but I disagree that we provide the content. We don't, Mumsnet does. This is their site not ours. They oversee what we post, delete what doesn't fit criteria and manage... because it's their content. They have control of it and that's what makes it theirs.

None of that really matters. It's not our site, we choose to post on it or read it, or not. The advertisers are there for the site traffic, whether we post or not, we're there. That is my understanding of it.

As the saying goes, if it's free, then you are the product. I use an ad blocker which works well on MN, and as PP have pointed out, unlike some sites, MN doesn't ask me to turn the blocker off.

I have never seen it before today (I use the mobile site and have it set to permanently logged in). But if you have seen it before that would suggest that they have just changed some setting to show the existing one (which does not force cookie consent) more often, and that a new, more robust gateway that pushes back on ad blockers and forces users to accept cookies or pay, is yet to be launched.

I think this is the incentive I need to kick my mumsnet habit.

I thought most people realised if a site or service or magazine is free to you, it's because your attention is the commodity being sold.

Without the good will and freely shared knowledge and expertise of many posters it will. There will be very little to advice and support read so little traffic for any advertising revenue.

Oh yes good point. Thanks! Are they easy to install? I have zero skills at tech wizardry.

I don’t care tbh

The content is provided by the users of the site who post the content.
MN hosts the content, they do not provide it, it's you me and the rest of us typing away that provide the content.

Mumsnet are not compliant with their own privacy policy, which does not support the Pay or Consent model described.

The email address for their DPO is [email protected], or of course, you can go straight to the ICO.

Thanks for the heads up, OP.

I'll take a look at the thread you've linked to.

Anyone remember the old days when Justine Mumsnet used to discuss things with us?

I don’t know if you have an iPhone but I have a handy feature on mine called ‘hide distracting items’. On the internet address bar, to the left of the padlock, there’s an icon with a rectangle then some lines beneath. Press there and a menu should pop up. One of the options is ‘hide distracting items’. It will then let you press where the adverts are and they disappear. Then press ‘done’ top right when you’ve finished.
You can always do the same process to show the adverts again should you so desire.

Disclaimer: This should only be used by those that need to. Not by ‘freeloaders’. Passing it on for accessibility only- I’m not a ‘bad actor’ 🥴

Not necessarily - any site that says I need to accept cookies or pay, I look at in incognito mode. The cookies are not saved.

That's what I'll be doing with Mumsnet from now on.