This is perhaps the most lucid discussion I know of, outside of Erowid's own conference presentations and articles, about the discrepancy between mainstream media representations of the risks of using newer euphoric stimulants like MDPV between Erowid and the "opportunistic and decadent sensationalism of contemporary news reporting"".

While dominant understandings of drug use derived from news media routinize atrocity to cultivate fear and intrigue among consumers (Altheide, 1997; Altheide and Michalowski, 1999), a competing paradigm circulating in the cultural ether challenges these hyperbolic depictions and constructs an alternative vision. Internet forums and web spaces provide a platform for recreational drug users and subcultural group members to network and share drug experiences, as well as resist dominant discourses that depict drugs like bath salts as inevitably unfurling horrifying consequences on their users. Such communities are better able to account for the complex and highly varied conditions under which drug experiences manifest, and provide a radical break from the opportunistic and decadent sensationalism of contemporary news reporting.