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This is a fascinating article, but I can't help thinking that I wish they were more technically incompetent so it harmed their business. The Daily Mail has to b

This is a fascinating article, but I can't help thinking that I wish they were more technically incompetent so it harmed their business. The Daily Mail has to be one of the most repugnant media organizations and if there is ever a justification for using the word 'evil' in relation to an institution then they are it.

JonnieCache 13y ago
Read this new yorker piece for an insight into how cynical they are: http://www.newyorker.com/reporting/2012/04/02/120402fa_fact_collins http://www.newyorker.com/reporting/2012/04/02/120402fa_fact_... Apparently they realised that there's zero chance of the two readerships ever intersecting, so they let their guard down. It's pretty shocking, even to someone who already reviles them.
teh_klev 13y ago
My own thoughts were along the the lines of "what a waste of talent on such a scumbag publication". "Tables are co-located, meters away from the news desk ‘the customers’, meaning it only takes minutes if something breaks for the communication between the developer and the user." Meh, can you imagine sitting across from journalistic horrors like Melanie Phillips or Peter Hitchens, and being torn between fixing your shit quickly or doing the nation a favour and delaying publication of their right wing tripe from poisoning the weak minded for just a few minutes/hours longer.
- slashdotdash 13y ago
  Their journalists hold their opinions because they can earn a good living by doing so, not because they particularly believe them. > The Mail attracts writers, who ought to oppose it, because it pays them top rates on one condition only: they say exactly what the editor wants them to say. You can get at least £1,000 for a morning’s work, and Dacre will fill your pockets even if he decides not to use your piece. Writers will bark like a performing seal for money as easy as that. http://blogs.spectator.co.uk/nick-cohen/2013/10/who-is-the-greater-hypocrite-mehdi-hasan-or-the-british-left/ http://blogs.spectator.co.uk/nick-cohen/2013/10/who-is-the-g...
  - hipsters_unite 13y ago
    That sounds familiar. I know somebody who worked on our student paper that swallowed their beliefs to go and work for the Mail because it was the only paper still hiring. Not believing in it doesn't absolve you from being complicit in it, though.
    - oneeyedpigeon 13y ago
      I actually have more respect for someone who is a genuine right-wing nutjob and tells it like it is than someone who abandons their principles and sells out. As Marina (of 'and The Diamonds') so eloquently put it "better to be hated / than loved, loved, loved for what you're not".
- lhnz 13y ago
  The Daily Mail position was paying upto £100k for their permanent software engineers. That + being able to offer people a greenfield project using Clojure and Node.JS probably attracted great engineers.
  - oneeyedpigeon 13y ago
    Still not worth it.
  - camus2 13y ago
    some western prostitutes make more in Saudi Arabia,what's your point ? The Daily Mail is evil period.
    - lhnz 13y ago
      My point was that if you are making a decision explicitly on salary and interesting technology it was a good choice. I'm sorry if this was not clear. Were you asking me to explain my point because you find the existence of a rational explanation for intelligent people working for the company extremely offensive? It's a common fallacy to assume that political beliefs are connected to intelligence. You should always consider the possibility that there are smart people who hold different political/ethical positions to you. The engineers that joined might not consider the publication evil, and they might not like the grossly-offensive insinuation by you that they are like western prostitutes in Saudi Arabia (?!).
enko 13y ago
> The Daily Mail has to be one of the most repugnant media organizations Hm, I don't know. I sort of respect them, in a way. In some ways I think of them as the authentic voice of the impotent lower middle classes, lashing out at everything around them, greedy, cynical, childish and shallow, blaming others, ever seeking some outraged scandal to distract them from their otherwise mundane lives. Hate the Mail if you will, but you're basically hating their audience too. I don't like the Mail, but at least they're independent, seemingly serving no-one's agenda but their own. Murdoch is much worse, in my opinion.
- hipsters_unite 13y ago
  I hate the Mail because it encourages the worst in its audience. I have to believe that if the people that read it and I could reach a compromise if we weren't being so polarized by their reading material. Being "greedy, cynical, childish and shallow, blaming others" are all vices at the end of the day (FYI despite the tone of my comment here, I'm actually not religious). I agree totally that Murdoch is worse, but I think the Mail does hold more sway in a vocal area of the population with political power. The fact that they never acknowledge their hypocrisy or the damage they do I think is also offensive on an intellectual level that the Sun et al never quite reach as they're so cartoon-like.
  - enko 13y ago
    I agree with everything you wrote. But the problem is, what can anyone do to fix it? I mean it's easy to come up with a plan to "fix" Murdoch. Simply tighten media ownership rules, so that one family or organisation can't own more than a certain small percentage of media. And I take your point that the Sun is pretty clownish in the UK, but in Australia they're far more insidious. (¶) But how do you fix the Mail? They're like this perfect endgame of free press. There's no big conspiracy; they're simply the answer to the question: "what does the angry disenfranchised demographic want to read about?". And while I lament the means by which said class seeks to assuage its anger, I do sympathise that they have a lot to be angry about. All this is why I find it hard to wrestle with the question of the Mail. I want to hate them, but some part of me holds back, because I feel that's too close to simple class discrimination, and because I can't shake the feeling that they're the symptom, not the cause, of society's ills. (¶) Check out the Murdoch press's outrageous bias in the recent Australian election: http://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2013/aug/05/daily-telegraph-election-australia http://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2013/aug/05/daily-t...
Joe8Bit 13y ago
It's interesting, I know several engineers who've worked at (or currently work at) the Mail Online and they all talk about the 'Daily Mail Tax' salary bump they required in order to slice off a little bit of their soul to work there. Technical recruiters I know talk about it too, how they describe this very cool roll their trying to fill, deliberately obfuscating who it's for, before eventually having to reveal it and usually loosing most of their potentials.
Goladus 13y ago
I'm curious, can you be more specific about why they are "repugnant" and "evil?" Preferably something longer than 318 characters and shorter than the rambling 8,500 word New Yorker essay.

JonnieCache 13y ago

Read this new yorker piece for an insight into how cynical they are: http://www.newyorker.com/reporting/2012/04/02/120402fa_fact_collins http://www.newyorker.com/reporting/2012/04/02/120402fa_fact_... Apparently they realised that there's zero chance of the two readerships ever intersecting, so they let their guard down. It's pretty shocking, even to someone who already reviles them.

teh_klev 13y ago

My own thoughts were along the the lines of "what a waste of talent on such a scumbag publication". "Tables are co-located, meters away from the news desk ‘the customers’, meaning it only takes minutes if something breaks for the communication between the developer and the user." Meh, can you imagine sitting across from journalistic horrors like Melanie Phillips or Peter Hitchens, and being torn between fixing your shit quickly or doing the nation a favour and delaying publication of their right wing tripe from poisoning the weak minded for just a few minutes/hours longer.

slashdotdash 13y ago
Their journalists hold their opinions because they can earn a good living by doing so, not because they particularly believe them. > The Mail attracts writers, who ought to oppose it, because it pays them top rates on one condition only: they say exactly what the editor wants them to say. You can get at least £1,000 for a morning’s work, and Dacre will fill your pockets even if he decides not to use your piece. Writers will bark like a performing seal for money as easy as that. http://blogs.spectator.co.uk/nick-cohen/2013/10/who-is-the-greater-hypocrite-mehdi-hasan-or-the-british-left/ http://blogs.spectator.co.uk/nick-cohen/2013/10/who-is-the-g...
- hipsters_unite 13y ago
  That sounds familiar. I know somebody who worked on our student paper that swallowed their beliefs to go and work for the Mail because it was the only paper still hiring. Not believing in it doesn't absolve you from being complicit in it, though.
  - oneeyedpigeon 13y ago
    I actually have more respect for someone who is a genuine right-wing nutjob and tells it like it is than someone who abandons their principles and sells out. As Marina (of 'and The Diamonds') so eloquently put it "better to be hated / than loved, loved, loved for what you're not".
lhnz 13y ago
The Daily Mail position was paying upto £100k for their permanent software engineers. That + being able to offer people a greenfield project using Clojure and Node.JS probably attracted great engineers.
- oneeyedpigeon 13y ago
  Still not worth it.
- camus2 13y ago
  some western prostitutes make more in Saudi Arabia,what's your point ? The Daily Mail is evil period.
  - lhnz 13y ago
    My point was that if you are making a decision explicitly on salary and interesting technology it was a good choice. I'm sorry if this was not clear. Were you asking me to explain my point because you find the existence of a rational explanation for intelligent people working for the company extremely offensive? It's a common fallacy to assume that political beliefs are connected to intelligence. You should always consider the possibility that there are smart people who hold different political/ethical positions to you. The engineers that joined might not consider the publication evil, and they might not like the grossly-offensive insinuation by you that they are like western prostitutes in Saudi Arabia (?!).

enko 13y ago

> The Daily Mail has to be one of the most repugnant media organizations Hm, I don't know. I sort of respect them, in a way. In some ways I think of them as the authentic voice of the impotent lower middle classes, lashing out at everything around them, greedy, cynical, childish and shallow, blaming others, ever seeking some outraged scandal to distract them from their otherwise mundane lives. Hate the Mail if you will, but you're basically hating their audience too. I don't like the Mail, but at least they're independent, seemingly serving no-one's agenda but their own. Murdoch is much worse, in my opinion.

hipsters_unite 13y ago
I hate the Mail because it encourages the worst in its audience. I have to believe that if the people that read it and I could reach a compromise if we weren't being so polarized by their reading material. Being "greedy, cynical, childish and shallow, blaming others" are all vices at the end of the day (FYI despite the tone of my comment here, I'm actually not religious). I agree totally that Murdoch is worse, but I think the Mail does hold more sway in a vocal area of the population with political power. The fact that they never acknowledge their hypocrisy or the damage they do I think is also offensive on an intellectual level that the Sun et al never quite reach as they're so cartoon-like.
- enko 13y ago
  I agree with everything you wrote. But the problem is, what can anyone do to fix it? I mean it's easy to come up with a plan to "fix" Murdoch. Simply tighten media ownership rules, so that one family or organisation can't own more than a certain small percentage of media. And I take your point that the Sun is pretty clownish in the UK, but in Australia they're far more insidious. (¶) But how do you fix the Mail? They're like this perfect endgame of free press. There's no big conspiracy; they're simply the answer to the question: "what does the angry disenfranchised demographic want to read about?". And while I lament the means by which said class seeks to assuage its anger, I do sympathise that they have a lot to be angry about. All this is why I find it hard to wrestle with the question of the Mail. I want to hate them, but some part of me holds back, because I feel that's too close to simple class discrimination, and because I can't shake the feeling that they're the symptom, not the cause, of society's ills. (¶) Check out the Murdoch press's outrageous bias in the recent Australian election: http://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2013/aug/05/daily-telegraph-election-australia http://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2013/aug/05/daily-t...

Joe8Bit 13y ago

It's interesting, I know several engineers who've worked at (or currently work at) the Mail Online and they all talk about the 'Daily Mail Tax' salary bump they required in order to slice off a little bit of their soul to work there. Technical recruiters I know talk about it too, how they describe this very cool roll their trying to fill, deliberately obfuscating who it's for, before eventually having to reveal it and usually loosing most of their potentials.

Goladus 13y ago

I'm curious, can you be more specific about why they are "repugnant" and "evil?" Preferably something longer than 318 characters and shorter than the rambling 8,500 word New Yorker essay.