Postcard from the Slope

GERSH TAKES ON THE BROOKLYNIAN: YAY

13 Comments

According to the Brooklyn Paper, things have gotten realy REALLY NASTY on the Brooklynian, a Park Slope community blog and message board. Discussions of the new Seventh Avenue eatery, Elementi, hit new lows (and that’s pretty low) when blog-posters began trashing the restaurant even before it opened. They were just pissed that Snooky’s went out of business and decided to take it out on the people who were opening Elementi.

It’s totally legitimate to be angry when a beloved local institution goes out of business. It’s even legitimate for people to share their pain and loss on the Internet

But is it right to condemn the incoming restaurant even before it opens? Did people on the Brooklyniam message board go beyond the beyond?

Probably. But that’s the nature of message boards.

Gersh Kuntzman, editor of the Brooklyn Paper, looked into the situation and even had dinner at the restaurant, which he enjoyed immensely. But that wasn’t the point. He just wondered if it was fair to take out the closing of Snooky’s on the new owners of Elementi.

I for one avoid the Brooklynian and think of it as a very toxic blog. Snarky and mean spirited, the Brooklynian is not where I want to spend my reading time. But hey, that’s just me.

Full disclosure: People on the Brooklynian love to trash Smartmom. Thick skin. Thick skin. I try not to take this kind of stuff too seriously. But this kind of thing can really ruin a restuarant.

Here’s an excerpt from Gersh’s article.

I asked one of the moderators of the Brooklynian message board
whether it was considered fine by Web standards to slam an eatery
before anyone has actually eaten there, but he wouldn’t really answer.
“That’s kind of like asking the Internet what it thinks about the stuff
that gets posted on it,” he said.

That wasn’t enough for me, so I contacted Caseopele myself. She seemed proud of her handiwork.

“I
have a bit of a problem with people who push older businesses out only
to open another cookie-cutter business in its place,” she wrote via
e-mail.

I reminded her that no one “pushed” Snooky’s out — that
it merely closed for lack of business — but she responded that the
Rutledges “turned a perfectly good restaurant into what they thought
Park Slope needed. They think they know what the neighborhood wants but
they never ask.”

But that that’s what business people do: look
around, make their judgment and let the market — not anonymous yahoos
on Yahoo! — make its ruling (just as the market did to Snooky’s).

And
then I did something that Caseopele never did: I ate at Elementi. Full
disclosure? It was a kick-ass meal, from the pappardelle with oxtail to
the skirt steak.

So as far as I’m concerned, the issue is
settled. Now, can we all get back to using Web forums for important
discussions, like the gender of a toddler’s winter hat?

13 thoughts on “GERSH TAKES ON THE BROOKLYNIAN: YAY”

  1. Hi. I’m pensodyssey, not the joker who posted using a similar name below.
    I know nothing about any of the issues addressed here on this blog (except the mean-spirited nature of brooklynian) and, until now, have never posted here.

  2. Hi Louise – I’m really sorry to see the childish personal attacks below from “Gersh Kuntzman” and “pensodyssey”. It is especially embarrassing that these individuals (or individual) probably found your blog post through Brooklynian, a public message board, then decided to come here and insult you.
    I’m not sure why you didn’t delete those comments right away. Maybe you think these obscene comments will make your readers sympathetic to your case against Brooklynian as a “toxic” message board. If so, I can only point out that Brooklynian itself would never allow such obscene posts. If those messages were posted on Brooklynian, they would be vaporized in a matter of minutes.
    Our rules specifically prohibit personal attacks, and our moderators are ruthlessly effective in deleting such garbage. With that in mind, I’d encourage you to do what we do – delete the garbage.
    With regard to the so-called “blog war”: It was NEVER the intention of Brooklynian to insert itself in this manufactured “controversy” over what Park Slope citizens say on public message boards. Now that we are forced into a position of responding, I guess this moderator’s post sums up a lot of feelings about this “unfortunate” episode:
    http://www.brooklynian.com/forums/viewtopic.php?p=392958#392958

  3. I see some nasty comments here. 4 shame.
    But I have been following this thread for a day now and it seems that some entries have been deleted. Ugh.
    Heck of a catfight, huh?
    Have not seen the restaurant reviewed yet by a professional.Only if the restaurant was in some other space than a symbol of the old Slope, then maybe all of this kerfuffle would not have happened. Hell, I remember the yells when Al’s Toyland went away, or when a solid building went up on a Methodist Hospital vacant lot, now housing an unfortunate drug store, an unofficial babysitter in B+N, doctors offices and a needed garage.
    But the Brooklynian message board threads are great — a throwback to the old dialup Wild West days of electronic messaging.
    Sorry to see so many — yes some deservedly — get dragged thru the mud. Healthy way to vent, I guess. Beats murder by far.

  4. Gersh is well trained at this crap, after all he did work for the Post. And pretty we’ll there. And no matter what is written in whatever tense, Louise has rather thin skin. Especially for one who has made herself believe she’s the only “sanctioned” chronicler of life in the People’s Republic.
    Carnivore above got it right. A message board is an updated version of street gossip, again, Louise, something that you’ve NEVER stooped to put in your blog, eh?
    My question: who got the comped dinner?

  5. All this defensiveness by these message board people borders on “get a life”. Sorry had to say it.

  6. blah blah blah. the owners of elementi went way to far when they went to speak to the poster’s BOSS. it’s not as though she’s 12-years-old.
    if they wanted to speak with her directly, they could have done so. doing the other, screwing one of the well-liked frequent posters over at brooklynian isn’t going to win any points. and it may a whole lot of people not want to go to your restaurant.
    way to go, elementi.

  7. It was disingenuous of Gersh to imply that people were reviewing the restaurant without having eaten there. No one said a word about the food. What he fails to understand is that message boards are akin to stoop conversations and neighborhood gossip. What the new owners said about not wanting the old Snooky’s crowd at their establishment is totally fair game for this kind of discussion, regardless of whether they’ve opened yet. This is not a restaurant review, it’s people in he neighborhood discussing what’s going on in the neighborhood. And for the record, “It was a kick-ass meal” isn’t a review either.
    Also, it’s “Brooklynian” not “The Brooklynian.”

  9. Wow, I have to hand it to Gersh for leaving out a huge amount of information. Apparently, he didn’t feel the need to write about all the other things I said. That wouldn’t make the story good but it would have made it right. I guess a bunch of nasty barflies bashing a poor couple opening a new business for absolutely no reason sounds much better than the reality. I find it quite sad that Mr. Kuntzman chose to sacrifice his journalistic integrity for sensationalism. I would gladly produce the 9 emails that we exchanged, including the one where I asked to remain anonymous and to be notified when/if the article was published. He neglected to do both. Using my screen name (that is known to many people in PS) and can be used quite easily to identify me was a shameful attempt conceal my identity. Call me naive but I’m disappointed by this whole mess.

  13. “People on the Brooklynian love to trash Smartmom. Thick skin. Thick skin. I try not to take this kind of stuff too seriously. But this kind of thing can really ruin a restuarant.”
    Gosh. I can’t imagine why. This blog isn’t the paragon of lazy, stupid fluff. It’s so useful.

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