Discretion!

Anyone concerned about the influence of Bravo's "Start-ups: Silicon Valley" on the tech world might want to leave the room.

Last week, a picture surfaced of One Direction singer and former Taylor Swift paramour Harry Styles in a hot tub with Sir Richard Branson and several others on Mr. Branson's Caribbean island. On the other side of the hot tub, in a fetching red bikini: a mysterious blonde. Only it turns out this was no stranger to the tech scene, but rather Hermoine Way, one of the star of Bravo's much-maligned reality show.

The rarified world of celebrity will party with Startupland if the hot tub temp is right, it seems!

Because Ms. Way was one of only two women in the photo (and the only whose bikini was visible), she was soon the subject of headlines like "Revealed: Identity of sexy blonde Harry Styles shared hot tub with on Branson’s Necker island."

Well, as Business Insider reports, Ms. Way has now taken to her Facebook with a lengthy expose of how she was offered a great pile of filthy lucre to dish on Mr. Styles, which opened "Kiss and don't tell: Why I decided not to sell my 'dirty harry' story to the press."

It appears Ms. Way forgot about the "don't tell" part...unless Facebook notes to 14,699 followers count as keeping it discreet:

Today I could be well over $100,000 richer. This week I was blasted all over the tabloids because of a picture a friend posted on my Facebook in which I am hot tubbing with Richard Branson and Harry Styles - a band member of an apparently quite famous band called One Direction who had recently split from an apparently even more famous American singer called Taylor Swift.

One especially gossip-hungry reporter tracked her down and, when they met (Ms. Way "inquisitively wanted to find out how these sorts of deals are put together") offered her $80,000 to dish. This presented a dilemma for Ms. Way: $80,000 would make a nice little injection of seed capital. BUT!

But I had been invited into a very exclusive group of high-networth individuals on Necker where I got to hang out with Richard Branson for a week- I would not want to jeopardize my relationship with these incredibly amazing people or that of Branson. I said no.

At that point, the reporter told Ms. Way to name her price. My goodness, this is just like that scene in Sabrina, where Humphrey Bogart tries to bribe Audrey Hepburn to stay away from William Holden! Minus all the classiness, of course. And then what did Ms. Way do?

But keeping the trust and relationships of the group of people I was with on Necker island meant more to me than making a quick buck out of some poor, broken hearted teenage boy. I had one of the best weeks of my life on Necker with a group of people who are some of Silicon Valley and the technology industry's elite investors, entrepreneurs and technologists.

We're sure Mr. Styles appreciates her pity. Meanwhile, did she mention spending the week with Richard Branson? Because she spent the week with Richard Branson, and there’s no amount of money you can pay her to dish on the week she spent with Richard Branson.

Mr. McClure (Screencap: BravoTV)

The moment you've all been waiting for is briskly approaching. Though the much-maligned Start-Ups: Silicon Valley reality show doesn't premiere until Monday November 5th at 10 p.m., Bravo has begun publishing clips to its website in order to sate our boundless curiosity. AllThingsD picked up on the two drama-filled scenes, one of which features 500 Startups cofounder and noted giver of zero fucks Dave McClure.

In the clip, Mr. McClure has taken time out of his busy schedule to go through the pitch deck of brother-sister duo Ben and Hermione Way for their "health and lifestyle startup" called Ignite. Mr. McClure quickly asks to take over the laptop and flip through the pitch deck himself, which Mr. Way immediately classifies as "annoying."

"It was slightly disrespectful, him going through the whole thing and making his own judgments," he tells the camera in a cut-away confessional. As AllThingsD notes, that is, of course, why Mr. McClure was even looking at the deck in the first place. We can't believe he spends his off-time browsing through poorly-designed PowerPoints just for fun.

Mr. Way, it seems, is definitely not here to make friends.

(Photo: Instagram/Ben Leventhal)

Bjorking Your Bachelor Party As a sign of just how many bachelor parties an up-and-coming venture bro is obligated to attend, during a recent PandoMonthly panel, Thrillist Ben Lerer said if he had to pick a totally ordinary superpower, it would be making sure his wife was cool with him going to bachelor parties. (To be fair, it took him a long time to come up with it, so it might not be that high on his list.) Hopefully his better half was understanding about a recent trip Mr. Lerer took to Iceland celebrate the end of singledom for Spark Capital's Mo Koyfman.

The recently promoted general partner invited a number of other techies for the festivities, including Eater.com cofounder Ben Leventhal and what looks an awful lot like Jakob Lodwick and Ricky Van Veen, who Mr. Koyfman would know from his days as an IAC executive "adult supervising" College Humor. Definitely present? Author and MSNBC cohost Touré! Mr. Koyfman tested hashtags for Instagramming his international excursion, trying out #koyfops before settling on #icemomo, although NYC yoga instructor Heather Lilleston also suggested #mochella.

Mr. Koyfman is engaged to Hilary Rosenman, CEO and founder at the shoe line Madison Harding. Ms. Rosenman is a graduate of the Upper East Side's prestigious Nightingale School, where she went with fellow fashion designer Charlotte Ronson. Her entrepreneurial exploits have been documented by no less than investor Joanne Wilson, better known as Gotham Gal.

Wait, when did this become the Vows section?

The New Rock Stars Bravo released an extended trailer for its upcoming, widely-panned new series Start-ups: Silicon Valley. In one scene, sibling stars Ben and Hermione Way are seen sitting at a conference table across from a slew of investors. Connie Loizos, a reporter for PEHub, confirmed their identities via Twitter: the two of the men in the scene are Noah Doyle and Jed Katz of Javelin Venture Partners. "just realizing the puzzled-looking investors in this clip are noah doyle and jed katz of javelin ventures," she tweeted. "poor guys."

(Screenshot: Bravo)

We can only hope that they weren't there to make friends.

Cultural Literacy Speaking of Startups: Silicon Valley, sounds like not every citizen of techlandia plans on boycotting and/or furiously protesting the controversial new show. Earlier this week, Google director of project management Hunter Walk confessed that he's "Been invited to 2x more viewing parties for Bravo's Silicon Valley show than for presidential debates." Dire portent of America's decline, or revealing statement regarding startup self-involvement?

Only the wild-eyed witches of the Real Housewives franchise are qualified to answer, and they're not talking.

xoxo, Gossip Girl Since we still haven't found the time to download Spotify onto our work computer, we've been saddled with that old music standby: Pandora. This week we noticed that the typical background, which is usually dark blue with lighter blue bubbles, was replaced by a large photo of Pandora founder Tim Westergren. "Hmm, he looks familiar," we thought. "Where have we seen him before?"

(Photo: Pandora)

Turns out we had seen him in the deliciously trashy teen drama Gossip Girl--well, kind of. Mr. Westergren looks remarkably similar to Rufus Humphrey, father to Jenny and Dan Humphrey and portrayed by Matthew Settle on the scandalous show.

(Photo: NYMag)

The last time we spotted Mr. Settle in Startupland was with Brew PR cofounder Brooke Hammerling at the Gizmodo "First Comes the Dream" event.

If that whole Pandora thing doesn't quite pan out, we suppose Mr. Westergren can always play a Rufus Humphrey stand-in.

Mayor of Mindshare: How ubiquitous is Foursquare? What happens in the hinterlands is anyone's guess, but the company certainly seems to have New York City on lock. The latest evidence is this snapshot, recently tweeted by Google trendspotter Caroline McCarthy:

Been there!

As Ms. McCarthy points out, context is implicitly assumed to be unnecessary. And we must say, as insider-y local advertising goes, it's far more charming than the tired, am-I-right politicking of Manhattan Mini Storage.

@Emrboidery  How seriously do you take the consistency of your social media branding? Probably not as seriously as Sincerely community manager and noted Instagrammer Doctor Popular. As revealed by this dispatch from Laughing Squid ringleader Scott Beale, the good doctor has his twitter handle--@docpop--embroidered on the inside of his suit jacket:

Sporty!

Hey, there are probably worse ways to get an abandoned item of clothing back.

As always: Overheard a juicy tidbit about impending departures or imminent acquisitions? Dying to dish about startup blunders or frothy financing? Holler at your girls: tips@betabeat.com