Daily Mail in "own goal" shock...

[nichomach]

M&S drop ads in Mail

Ouch...should someone have warned the Mail about the consequences of crapping on your own customers?

[nichomach]

In November, M&S was said to have made a complaint following an inaccurate Mail on Sunday report that said it was planning to sell up to half of its small-scale Simply Food convenience stores

I don't feel that inaccurate reporting is in anyone's interest, certainly not the public's. In this case, the Mail on Sunday appears to have published misleading information which certainly had the potential to damage M&S's reputation, and to have failed to check its accuracy prior to publication; not that I care about M&S particularly, but the Mail have a habit of doing that. I seem to recall a fair amount of gleeful hand-rubbing here when the scalp of Piers was taken following the faked abuse photos story, and a general perception that he got what was coming to him. At least now the Mail will be aware that while they can publish what they like (short of defamation), when they misreport events or publish untruths there may be consequences. Would you really want that any other way?

[Rave]

Paul, I agree that a paper (or any other form of news media) should not hold back from publishing a story just because they risk losing advertising revenue. However, this is the Mail we're talking about so the point is moot, they wouldn't know journalistic integrity if it came up and whacked them on the head with a placard saying 'this is journalistic integrity'.

Rich :¬)

[nichomach]

Agreed; and whilst I would not wish to see fair and impartial reporting come under undue commercial influence, "fair and impartial" does, I think, carry an implicit expectation of accuracy. I also wouldn't say that accurate reporting, even if unfavourable, was crapping on anyone. Inaccurate unfavourable reporting, however, I would argue is, even if it's of a company like M&S.