Is “Shane’s Boy” a Rumour-Spreading Twitter Troll?
Evidence suggests VICE’s chief of staff, Niall Cooney (aka ‘Shane’s Boy’) ran a very angry Twitter account.
A couple days ago, my favourite Twitter account disappeared. It maintained zero followers and spent a lot of time defending Shane Smith (and trolling me). I enjoyed it because I long suspected who ran it as it blasted off angry, unhinged tweets (archived below).
The account came to my attention after I posted a series of images of Vice Media CEO Shane Smith.
The account “@mangustaNYC” called me obsessive and asked what f*** was wrong with me. After I retweeted their troll, the account began calling me ‘mentally ill’ and ‘f***ed in the head’. For a month, I tracked its activity. (Archived)
The account’s final tweet was directed at Emily Steel, the NYTimes reporter who published the bombshell story on the Vice Media’s culture of sexual harassment and cover ups.
A calculated smear on Christmas, then a couple days later the account disappeared.
Following the Breadcrumbs of @mangustaNYC
The 8 year old Twitter account followed about 400 people but zero accounts followed it. Still, after 8 years of sloppy OPSEC, 1400 tweets and 7000 likes it’s pretty easy play ‘Guess Who?’
More than 10% of the follows were current and former Vice employees – Shane being the earliest. It tweeted at Shane in 2011 “Is yer bberry all screwy". Some of its earliest follows were accounts with the last name ‘Cooney’, the breadcrumbs that lead me to an employee on Vice’s Masthead: Niall Cooney.
I don’t know what caused the account to disappear, but since the discovery I began to share my hunch more widely. Each new tweet was cherished, pervious tweets a cornucopia of rage.
It was probably the Twitter analytics activity that tipped off the account owner that it was being monitored. Analytics can cause a huge spike in ‘Twitter impressions’. Someone with zero followers might have noticed.
This small account wanted to be noticed but really didn’t want to be followed. A few weeks ago, ‘mangustaNYC’ dropped the number of people it followed by 80 and purged its only two followers (who on Twitter doesn’t want followers?). Very odd.
More breadcrumbs at the end of the article.
Who is Niall Cooney and Why “Shane’s Boy”?
“Shane’s Boy” is the dog-like nickname of Niall Cooney chief of staff (former?), producer at Vice Media.
Update: Some people are telling me he is Shane’s personal assistant and the job title “chief of staff” is one of those inflated job titles Vice is known to give from time-to-time.
After passing around my findings I heard several rumours about Niall. The least controversial being that he once puked while giving a presentation. Also that he lost his job and had to ask for it back in a dramatic fashion.
As “Shane’s Boy” Niall was tasked with fighting Eddie Huang in some weird promotion thing aimed at media buyers. The boy from Dublin, Ireland got beat up in service of a wildly underperforming TV station: VICELAND.
Anger and Breadcrumbs
Besides following 50+ Vice employees the “mangustaNYC” (aka “chancer”) Twitter account:
- Followed many British / Irish celebrities.
- Tweeted suggestions to a Cork (Ireland) Parliamentarian. (Archived)
- In 2011, tweeted about being married for 5 years. (Archive)
- Account ‘Clutch Cooney’ “@BazCooney1” thanked “@mangustaNYC” for seats behind Connor McGregor at an Oct 2015 UFC event in Dublin, Ireland. The event was covered by Vice’s vertical Fightland. (Archived) [NOTE: Niall Cooney’s Instagram handle is “bigclutchcooney”]
- In 2011, the account ‘Clutch Cooney’ asked mangustaNYC to “go on Skype”. (Archived) [NOTE: Brother?]
- Seemed especially interested in the Ardesia Wine Bar in Hell’s Kitchen NYC for whatever reason.
- Called Mike Cernovich, the controversial Alt Light commentator, a ‘rampant pedophile’. (Archived)
- Taunted Chuck Johnson, the far-right gossip writer with the hashtag #poopgate. Chuck wrote an expose on Shane Smith for The Daily Caller in 2013. (Archived)
- Told an NRA spokesperson, advocating a concealed carry law, to ‘die screaming’. (Archived)
- Told Abdullah Saeed, the Bong Apetit Viceland producer, to “go home” when he announced on Twitter that he was leaving for moral reasons. (Archived)
- Tweeted at Newt Gingrich that he was surprised his “cancer-riddled ex” didn’t kill him after his affair. “You should have eaten a f***ing gun then.” (Archived)
- Called the Matthews & Associates, an anti-vax law firm, a “shameless lying f***ing cunt.” (Archived)
- Retweeted Shane Smith’s appearance on Joe Rogan Podcast
- In 2012, re-tweeted an article by Vice co-founder Gavin McInnes about 10 people who lost their jobs for being politically incorrect.
- Retweeted a Vice documentary.
- Tweeted defending Viceland when someone tweeted “Bring back H2! Viceland is garbage!”
- Followed Phoebe Barghouty, the Muslim Vice correspondent who spoke to The Daily Beast about sexual harassment, shortly after the article was published.
- Called a journalist, who said Shane Smith might step down as a result of the article, “A f***ing hack.”
The Disqus username “mangustanyc” also left comments on:
- An article about New Jersey Governor Chris Christie.
- An article about Wall Street.
- An article titled Two Women Battle It Out on L Train As Baby Attempts Escape writing, “Won’t somebody think of the weaves??????” (Archived)
Lastly, “mangustanyc” was also used on the Yamaha XT500 forum (Archived)
- Account created January 2012 and listed their age as 41. Zero posts.
Breadcrumbs Don’t Make a Sandwich
It’s possible this account didn’t belong to Niall Cooney — VICE chief of staff, Producer and “Shane’s Boy”. But I fail to think of anyone else who might be: close with people from Dublin with the last name Cooney; defending Viceland; defending Shane’s image; following 50 Vice employees; following silence breakers and trolling those who write about them with obscure rumours. I’m always open to tips and suggestions.
Niall Cooney would not respond to multiple requests for comment (email, phone or text ***.***.*252). This story will be updated if there is any response.
ABOUT THE AUTHOR
DANIEL VOSHART is an occasional cinematographer, writer and forensic consultant. He works full time in architecture doing some neat stuff. Follow him on Twitter (not with your alt account).
ABOUT NOT VICE
not vice is a critical blog about Vice Media. The contents of this blog might become a book someday. For tweets about the best and worst of Vice Media follow not vice.
