First, nightlife blog Down by the Hipster tangled with Eater after it outed its anonymous writer Scott Solish and speculated that he had seen his best days, and now Solish is taking aim at Guest of a Guest’s Rachelle Hruska in a quickly escalating feud that has already led to accusations of shoddy journalism, comment tampering, and (gasp!) cluelessness about the Hamptons scene. Here’s the breakdown (bolding ours), followed by what Solish told us about the latest accusation, that a supposed Cain investor is the “second half” of his blog.
1. DBTH posts a photo of some pretty young things, asking if Hamptons heads aren’t jealous of the Ibiza scene.
2. GOAG, defender of all things Hamptons, says in this post that “Downbythehipster posted this Ibiza image perhaps hoping to invoke some sort of envy in his small readership who may have flocked to the Hamptons instead, or to make all five of them feel as if he knows what he is talking about. Since he doesn’t, we’ll help him out.” The gloves are off.
3. DBTH asks, in this post, “Is Rose Bar Ou’st?” — meaning, “Has it jumped the shark?,” because, according to a tipster, there are an increasing number of tables controlled by promoters.
4. This gets on GOAG’s nerves so much that she asks, in this post, “Is DBTH Ou’st” — saying that DBTH’s tipster was just getting the sloppy seconds of those who were away at the Hamptons: “These are the weekends that the next in line finally get a taste of what places like Rose Bar are actually like. So, instead of ragging on the people that head out east during these months, how about thanking them for giving you a chance to taste the lychee martinis.” [Or, “leechy” as it was spelled in the original post.]
5. Now things go nuclear. In this post, DBTH bids “bon voyage” to GOAG and Rachelle Hruska, describing her as “Friend of Steve Lewis and blogger lacking wit or ability.” Says DBTH, “Everything on her two GoaG sites is utterly worthless. Maybe we shouldn’t expect her to grasp these concepts. After all, this is the same person that says the Atlantis is in Dubai.” And it goes on from there. The comments are vicious. One of them accuses Hruska of commenting on her own blog under the name Stanley Stuyvesant. Stuyvesant shoots back, “Gofg might be pig vomit, but it would of course take a pig to know pig vomit. Moreover, you’re squealing like a stuck pig right now as you lash out to try and retain what little cred you once had.” There is much back and forth about page views, URLs, comments, and whether Hruska should go back to her native Nebraska.
6. GOAG, in this post, creates a URL called downbythehypocrite.com, making vague accusations of back-dating of posts, Photoshopped images, and fake and expletive-filled comments.
7. GoaG, in this post, does the unspeakable by outing one of DBTH’s “little birdies,” via a tipster: “The second half of DBTH is Jesse Herman, who is a very small time hotel and club investor. Among his holdings are a few points in Cain — just enough that he has access to confidential emails and memos send to investors. That’s how DBTH gets all that Cain news. And why every other post on DBTH is a shill for the club.”
Regarding this last accusation, Down by the Hipster e-mails us, “It’s 100% false. I am responsible for every post that goes up on the site. DBTH now has a few interns working for us in a news gathering sense, but i am editor in chief and the BMOC. Jesse and I have been friends for close to a decade. He is an independent business person and owns no interest in Cain or any of their affiliated clubs. DBTH has an abundance of Little Birdys who help out on a regular basis and we don’t ever give names. We don’t shill for Cain, we don’t shill for anyone. Who are we, Eater?”
Well, okay then.
