Stupid Dail Mail article

Adam W · May 14, 2013

It's not presented as 'fact' or even 'journalism' though - it's one guy's opinion. Some people will disagree with him, others agree, but very few will be "brainwashed" by the article or even "lap it up". Either way I don't think anyone could disagree that it makes for a good debate.

Ian-LS · May 14, 2013

He's on linked in i think as a journalist if you fancy messaging him there. Although i think the new comments slating the article kind of make up for him not being forced to retract the article.

SolarCity · May 14, 2013

Adam W said:
It's not presented as 'fact' or even 'journalism' though - it's one guy's opinion. Some people will disagree with him, others agree, but very few will be "brainwashed" by the article or even "lap it up". Either way I don't think anyone could disagree that it makes for a good debate.

Judging by the public's reaction to the MMR debacle, I would have to strongly disagree.

It's not really brainwashing, it's just a lazy public. If they read it in the newspaper, they tend to believe that it is true.

In this instance it is a failure on the editor's part. Articles like this cost people their livelihood and a certain amount of care should be taken when the decision to publish is taken.

Adam W · May 14, 2013

You can tell from the comments that a lot of people haven't just read the guy's opinion and taken it as the truth, and it's the same with a lot of articles in the Daily Mail, in fact a lot of the comments on other articles slate the standard of journalism.
I wouldn't say Daily Mail readers blindly follow what they read in their paper any more than the readers of any other paper. If anything Daily Mail readers tend to question it more, it's just they seem to get stereotyped the most.

Gavin A · May 14, 2013

yeah, but how many of them are actually daily mail readers? I'd bet most simply followed links from other places there - it was passed around twitter by REA and a few others fr example.

Adam W · May 14, 2013

Most of those comments were clearly written by Daily Mail reading happy solar customers and hadn't been imported in an attempt to sway the angle of the general consensus; compare the style of writing with the comments and the way the red and green arrows are dished out on stories where they find a rozzer asleep on the job and you'll see what I mean. It's quite clear which paper the police read.
I don't think it goes any deeper than that.

SolarCity · May 15, 2013

Recently, a Daily Mail story reported that left wing people were more likely to be intelligent than right wing people (yeah....in the Daily Mail). The comments were pretty clearly split between Daily Mail readers and non-Daily Mail readers.

That's the nature of the internet. It is far more easy to come across a Daily Mail story than it used to be. An innocent search for something relating to cancer, for example, could lead to a Daily Mail story hysterically claiming that wind turbines cause cancer or that cancer charity money is being spent on 'NHS tourists' or some nonsense like that.

Earthstore · May 15, 2013

My thoughts here are it does not matter which paper an article is written in, or who is perceived to be the general type of reader for any said papers, articles that could be so misleading are damaging to the renewable industry.

Without reading it again, what points spring to mind, 150 years payback stuck in mine, and I am sure that many others who doubt renewables will be even more convinced they do not work.

Remember, all newspaper readers, no matter which paper, whether they are left or right, intelligent or not are all your potential customers, and every one lost is difficult to replace.

Do you not think it is about time that renewables got some good press, there are enough success stories out there.

Harry_Worth · May 15, 2013

The article was not researched - The guy writing it was completely confused. The editor should have picked up on this story and pulled it - it had a prominent position so a potential 4 million readers (that's not circulation but a guess at how many people will read the passed around newspaper. It's sadly an inditement of todays press! Probably due to a lot of cost cutting, all the old hacks have gone and young inexperienced journalists totally out of their depth with no one to turn to. Sir David English would have chewed the balls of this idiot! It is so factually incorrect that surely there's a case for damages.

jerriais · May 16, 2013

I've put in a complaint to the Press Complaints Commission about the story. I'll let you know how it goes.

moggy1968 · May 21, 2013

Adam W said:
That sounds like a sweeping generalisation - the comments I read seemed to be split down the middle: those who 'believed' renewable energy is a waste of money (I suspect they may have thought that already) and those who are very happy with their solar PV installation. Either way I don't think anyone was 'suckered in' by this article.

I would say your comment is 'typical of left wing Daily Mail haters' dismissing everything you don't like as "Tory propaganda" with throwaway comments such as "the rich get rich and the poor get poorer", "Cameron's Britain" and "Vote UKIP" but that would just be too ironic.

I've read enough in the mail about topics I know about to know that they are more interested in an hysterical attention grabbing headline than the truth. Pretty much every article about anything I have detailed knowledge of suggests a minimal amount of research and accuracy. I don't waste time on any of the papers these days, but the mail is the bottom of the dregs of an industry that repeatedly plumbs the depths of depravity, disinformation and dishonesty. People who believe what they read in rags like the mail are naïve fools. Does that make me a left winger, no, just someone who doesn't get suckered in by the nonsence of this rag.