Political questioning in pms

[Graphista]

Just went to check my pms and a survey question popped up asking me something political

1 I do not want this happening in pms generally

2 I found the question annoying and offensive tbh particularly the insidious nature of how and where it was asked

Please - cut it out!

Hi Graphista

Can you let us know what device and browser this happened on?
Has it happened since, or was it just the once?

If it is still happening, can you possibly email us a screenshot?

I just had that pop up on active, it's not specific to PMs. I think it comes up wherever you are on the site.

It's very annoying and I don't think appropriate

iPhone safari I'll try and email a screenshot if it's still happening

Ok not happening now

It was a pop up and had a wee down arrow to reduce it to a heading only.

What on earth was it and why is it on mn?

Only had it popping up asking a question about Kier Starmer - surely in the balance of fairness it should also pop up and ask is Johnson a wanker?

They seem to do them every few weeks - I saw one about the tele abortions a few weeks ago, then another political one I ignored because I had no idea what it was asking me.

I think asking us political opinion in this insidious way is totally out of order

I'm guessing sponsored by someone - I'd love to know who!

Yy I agree. There seems to be a push - whether from MNHQ or advertisers or funders - to try to push specific political opinions.

And no further response from mnhq which is annoying and worrying

Hello there,

So we can try to pinpoint what happened there, it would be really helpful if we could get a screenshot of the advert/survey in question so that we can have a look. Feel free to post it on the thread, or to email us.
Thanks for your help with this.

Why don't you know what pop ups you are sending out? We're talking about the little purple ones that come up at the bottom of the screen. I had one yesterday about bank accounts.

Can't recreate the situation now so no I can't send a screenshot. The description really should be enough!

As @BertieBotts says you really ought to know what pop ups and questions etc you are exposing users to, who is behind them/sponsoring them etc

There is clearly an agenda here (I suspect a right leaning one based on the type and tone of the questions)

It's the surreptitious nature of them that really concerns me.

Mn has a long history of open and honest communication this flies right in the face of that ethos!

I don't welcome EVER anyone sliding into my pms unbidden and unwanted trying to gauge my opinion on contentious political matters!

Hi all

Apologies for the miscommunication - this was a poll we were running this week. It was site-wide (so not just specific to PMs).

The results of the poll can be seen here: twitter.com/mumsnettowers/status/1524780048494080000?s=21&t=Q5lWavON856bLE0VDe1h9w

There's nothing untoward and PMs still remain private, but we will discuss your feedback at HQ regarding placement.

So the pop ups have asked a number of questions, but the one you've chosen to tweet is the Starmer one. When will any others be shared? Are you going to ask questions about a range of politicians and parties? Are you being sponsored or working with any external group to select questions to ask? I agree that this sounds really oddly done and partisan, and the initial response of 'you'll have to send a screenshot' sounds even more shifty.

Hi there @Graphista and @Skiptheheartsandflowers. Thanks for the feedback! We use these Mumsnet Impact pop up polls as a way to gauge your views on topical issues, choose where to direct our campaigning resources and amplify Mumsnet users' voices.

The questions are generated independently.

You can see the results of a previous poll about Boris Johnson here, more info on the poll we did on telemedical abortion here and the results of the poll on birth choices here - and we also share the results through our campaigns email list, which you can sign up to here.

Nothing is truly random. In the case of automated questioning like this the developers agenda can consciously or unconsciously skew the type and tone of questions

I'm most concerned about the sneaky way it appeared