MN have used my quote to promote a product I’ve never bought 🤔

[Wondermoomin]

AIBU to expect MN recommendations, where they quote a poster/member, to be genuine?

I like being able to rely on recommendations in MN swears by and other emails. I excitedly opened an email with the subject “Big bargains for our most loyal Mumsnetters” wondering what MN could make me buy this time (I should probably get other hobbies).

Imagine my surprise to see my own username quoted there with a recommendation! Imagine my further surprise when I realised it was a post I wrote almost 8 years ago, and it was being used directly under a specific product to give the impression I was recommending it - and I’ve never even owned that particular thing mine was more expensive.

I don’t like posts being misrepresented as a recommendation for a specific product. It makes me question the credibility of other MN recommendations.

Hoping I’ll manage to attach screenshots.

PS my gazebo broke but I’ve replaced it. Still not with the brand I supposedly recommended according to the MN email.

Joining all you place markers for the inevitable deletion notice tomorrow morning.

That wouldn’t fly. The law is clear. It’s intended to look deceptive.

#metoo

What is the big deal?

Not really😆 just want to be in the thread so I can see their reply.

🤣my thread my was deleted. Shame they weren’t capable of deleting the child sexual exploitation photos that occurred this year so fast

You mean advertising isn’t always completely honest? Who knew..?

See, if this is what has happened, this is why AI is an absolute bag o'shite and needs to go in the bin.
You need actual people writing stuff, not bloody computers scraping and regurgitating content.

So who's responsible for the 'ai gone wrong'?

Who should be doing their due diligence?

I was speeding officer, but my ai told me it was 90 on the ai, so it's not my fault...

This is unfair.

Your thread was hidden by the unpaid voluntary Night Watch team. It is not them who are/were responsible for the child sex abuse images. They did what they could, within their limited admin access

Am I the only wondering what all the fuss is about?

Your description was of a pop up gazebo, they are using it to advertise a pop up gazebo. All the things you mention are true of the product in this advert, it really doesn't matter what brand it is, it is accurate to the product itself, there is nothing untrue or misleading about what they are using.

And you aren't recommending anything, you are describing how a pop up gazebo works and what you should look for and they are using your description to recommend a pop up gazebo which has those exact features. It's odd that they do this and I wasn't aware of it, but saying 'it's a completely different product' and you've 'never owned this product' is just weird.

🤔🤔🤔🤔

I totally disagree. This quote has been used to promote a specific pop up gazebo. This specific pop up gazebo could be really badly made and fall apart within minutes and look like the Op has said it's worth buying.

We have all seen dupes for sale online that are poor quality.

The recommendation implies it was written about that exact product.
If the recommendation had said “this was written about a similar product …” then that would be accurate.

Hi all, this thread was auto-hidden because of the volume of reports about it. We're looking into this as a matter of urgency to understand what’s going on here and will be back to respond as soon as possible. Thanks for raising this, Wondermoonin.

That's not how advertising works @sandyhappypeople 🙄

Please do come back Jo, I think we're all interested in how this happened and how prevalent this kind of thing is.

My example was from 2019 so predates AI. It was literally from the first random old MN email I found so I can’t say if it was just luck (good? bad?) or this is usual.

In that case it is true to say that the poster had included a link to the product advertised which is at least a stronger connection, but the quote was talking about a generic product, naming various outlets that sold similar one, and only included the one they supposedly recommended as a random example. The photo that prompted the question about where it was from was not the same one. So this is a grey area but the implication that the quote is a direct description of that particular product (with its affiliate link) is misleading. If a poster buys it thinking that someone has first hand genuine experience of that precise product, that is not the case.

@EmmaJane2025 no, I haven’t misunderstood anything, I think you’re probably being generous to MN in your interpretation.

@sandyhappypeople the words they’ve quoted make it sound like I’m talking about that product in the accompanying photo because they’ve chopped out the bit of my post that provides the correct reference point.

So when the email shows me saying “it’s light, easy to carry around” blah blah blah it makes it look like I’m talking about the one in the photo/linked - as there is no other “it” reference point provided.

@Notatallanamechange thank you for the AI hallucination explanation. I’m not completely persuaded that it’s AI. Some posters have found situations of old emails doing the same, and uptake of AI was lower then and has really exploded more recently. If it’s an AI issue it needs to be addressed of course, it’s no excuse for misleading people.

With that response from MNHQ, I suspect they've used an external agency to generate this content, and didn't check up whether they were accurate. Not very smart.

Handy that someone came along with an AI excuse for them to use. Yeah right 🤣

And another. Weird isn’t it that after 9am the good excuses start appearing 🤣

Its common T&C on all SM platforms.

However the issue here is more of dishonest advertising and fake reviews - that comes under ASA and consumer regulations.

Actually reading these emails properly, what is really obvious is that these product recommendations are usually just a random mention of one product on a thread full of other recommendations. ‘Where can I find a decent raincoat?’ etc. They are the affiliate link MN’s commerical team have chosen. Which does mean that most of the time the quote relates to the specific product at least but those recommendations really don’t carry a lot of weight.

People who regularly read the Swears By emails probably know this well but caveat emptor anyway. It’s entirely likely that the one recommendation quoted was followed by 20
more vehemently disagreeing and recommending something totally different!

Let’s be clear what the issue is…

I have no expectation of ownership over words I write online.

If MN had written an email saying “Wondermoomin raved about her pop up gazebo, we’ve found a similar one that’s reduced…” that would have been fine. (Even if it’s a bit odd to use such an old post.)

But the fact that MN have removed the reference points in my post(s) - got it from the garden centre, no idea what brand etc - and placed it next to a photo and link which makes it look like that photo and link is the “it” I’m talking about - well that’s deliberately misleading, and that is not cool. At all.

Its also irrelevant.

You can outsource work to people/machines but you can’t outsource the accountability.

I posted wondering whether they’d outsourced the marketing nearly 12 hours ago.

The conspiracy bollox is getting a bit overdone now.