"on MN this week" in the Daily Mail

[StealthBearWipesBumOnDailyMail]

Thread no 2

No, I am SAHM, formerly drug discovery medicinal chemist in a PLC - so I will take your cash! Mine's a PS3

If we are going to be in the DM can I request that it is on page three with our big milky norks out?

aaaah, must be nice having principles while hubby works. what plc? like, one of those drug companies that rakes in zillions off the back of poor sick bastards and doesn't release their formulations to third world countries?

OK, I take your point that we all sell out to live - maybe I should've been working on Bill Gates' malaria project - but to write something diametrically opposed to what you believe just to get published... ooh, it just makes me feel slightly soiled.

...and that's MsPrinciples to you

oh yes agree aitch, the masses would say no. But the way the users think about MN (small, private and cozy) and their business model often clash. It's the nature of the beast.

I doubt MN will lose many posters (just as they didn't over Mothercare - despite the handwringing at the time), and they will probably gain more (as they did from Mothercare).

i don't think anyone much believes in the daily mail, it's a rant rag. rather amazing at that, it's transformed newspapers in front of our very eyes.

well, x-post, but point remains. I was working on cancer drugs, to be sold for £££ to be sure. Still useful though.

You writing for the DM too, Aitch?

Jodieo: mumsnet will survive,....this is just another moldie situation....only more interesting.....mn does not survive on the same few posters.....no one is irreplaceable.

i think i was brought here by mothercare. distinctly remember sherlocklgj saying that we were all scum etc. i don't think that's quite the conversation here, the 'influx' issue has barely been touched on in fact. i think it bothered more the oldie moldie mindset tbh. most of us didn't know what it was like six years ago.

Yes I agree with aitch. Personally I would feel less sullied writing for the DM than I would working for an international pharmaceutical company (I really couldn't do that - despite having roughly the right sort of qualifications).

I think assuming something is legal and isn't fascist, well really the morality/principals card is a difficult one to play. Everyone has a list of activities they wouldn't engage in to earn money but there's no saying whose list is morally better than another.

JodieO, when things happen on MN there is always lots of chatter about leaving and so on however, firstly far fewer actually leave than say they will and secondly these publicity things always bring far more newbies along than are needed to replae the flouncing oldies IYSWIM.

FWIW though, I am happy with sharing my posts with MN, I am happy enough to have a couple of quotes about child rearing put in a book (although I am not sure I would be happy if they produced a "random drunken rants about bumsex" book!) and I accept that quotes will be lifted and used by the press on occasion but I am not happy to hand over editorial control to the DM in this way - even if we feel that the journo in question may be relativly ethical her bosses won't be - bosses pay wages and ethics can be bought so I don't feel that can be relied on.

I think I am coming down on the side of, reserve judgment to see if MN take this one up, if they do great, if not flounce (well, slope off anyway) - and limited or no posting until the situation has become clear. Over-reaction is silly but no action is not something I am happy with either.

MNHQ, I really do hope this one is something you can address, I understand you may not want to but IMO accepting this is one step too far in the direction of a faceless commercial site. I know you will be sick of hearing about the nice little site this was in the beginning and I know that is not the world we are living in now but it would be better IMHO if the site stayed more in that general direction than the direction of other sites that should not be named!

no, it's not really my area. but i know they pay really, really well for our industry and tbh if they said they wanted me to be their tv critic i'd leap at it.

'Well, yeah, it pays the bills. If that's how you want to live your life.'

That's the way a lot of us have to live our lives.

Oh it boils down to the same argument really. Nice cozy MN versus MNHQ's wish for more punters.

The DM should pay. Other businesses who come on here have to pay some sort of fee.

And the money should start a fund for SweetnessFollows and others who have been embarrassed, although would suggest for Sweetness, that she invites old boss onto Jeremy Kyle or some daytime TV program to sort it out...

Dp and KC I know I've been here a few years now, can't even remember which year I joined lol. It's not nice to lose people that you get on with and that contribute a lot though. Obviously a lot of people are unhappy about this.

awww poor MNHQ must be inundated!
I personally can't stand the Daily Male.
But LH is utterly lovely.
It's a dilemma for sure.

do you think? i suppose i can see that. maybe i just haven't seen the nice cozy mn though, it's got bigger in the last three years but it's still a warm place imo.

they'll all be back. faq's never managed a flounce longer than a week.

hi veev!

Saintly, I don't know that that is true really, MN lost its "small and cosy" a few years ago - for me anyway but it has retianed its integrity in the most part - well as far as I am concerned anyway, agreeing to this would - IMO compromise the integrity of the site.

Bonsoir mesdames

saintlydamemrsturnip on Fri 14-Aug-09 22:29:17 - spot on!

Really? You would all be happy to write articles on how working mums and immigrants are destroying the country for union rates? Fair enough. Guess it's just me then.

heather - it's no wonder you know so much about journalism, being a chemist n all.

FWIW, it wasn't a large pharma co, it was a smaller contract research organisation that would, er, sell its researchers' time to the highest bidder. No prostitution analogy there, no way!