Chris Sinclair was the events manager for model Sarah Budge's Kings Cross venue Crane Bar when he started the blog Surely Not. He said the blog was anonymous because "people would make false assumptions about my motivation". "I wanted the focus on the writing, not who wrote it. So many people these days play the man, not the content," he said. Miss Budge said the blog was "all Chris". "He has nothing to do with John ... John has nothing to do with Crane," she said.

Last year, a Keep Sydney Open campaigner tried to distance the anti-lockout movement from John Ibrahim when he addressed a Senate inquiry. Credit:Fairfax Media "Chris was working here and he loved it as a venue. The motivation is to get behind us, the businesses who suffered and our friends who suffered." Although Crane was winning awards and continued to trade by running live music and comedy nights, business was down and it was hard to fill a large venue, she said. Ralph Kelly. Credit:Brianne Makin "We are trying to change the way we run the venue to get people to the area. People don't roam the street. We don't get walk-in traffic. We try to get people to events and buying tickets."

Last year, Keep Sydney Open campaigner Tyson Koh tried to distance the anti-lockout movement from Mr Ibrahim when he addressed a Senate inquiry. Mr Koh complained that licensing police treated "cool hipster bars as if they are John Ibrahim ... I have mates who started bars by maxing out their credit cards and getting their friends to paint the walls – they are not John Ibrahim". Campaigners also complained about media reporting of Mr Ibrahim's attendance at the anti-lockout rally on February 21. The relationship between Miss Budge and Mr Ibrahim made headlines after the pair were photographed on a week-long holiday in Ibiza with Kyle Sandilands in 2015. Mr Sandilands, who has attacked NSW Premier Mike Baird on radio over the lockout laws, was an investor in Kings Cross bars associated with Mr Ibrahim that have been forced to close since the lockout came in.

Mr Sinclair praises Mr Sandilands and Mr Ibrahim on his blog as "two men of considerable influence and power". He also notes an earlier campaign by the pair to address violence in Kings Cross, a video – involving Mr Ibrahim and Mr Sandilands and called "Don't be a dickhead" – fell flat. Mr Sinclair said his friends knew he "liked to rant" and the blog was "quite emotive, sensationalist even" to get attention. He said he was not to blame for the subsequent threats made to the Kellys, or the defacing of a memorial to Thomas Kelly in Kings Cross. "I was pretty disgusted by some of the hate," he said.

"There's always the risk that unhinged individuals will react in a way you don't want them to. That's something I can't control, but I won't let it stop me from what I am doing." Mr Sinclair sent Mr Barrie, Miss Budge and 19 other Kings Cross promoters and former bar owners a message the weekend before submissions to the lockout review closed, providing links to his blog. "Don't fret. A lot of the work has already been done for you," he wrote. He told Fairfax Media it was a "call to arms" to participate in the legislative review. "There's no point going to all these rallies, doing all this stuff and when it actually comes down to crunch time, doing the one thing that might make a difference, not doing anything," he said.

Then premier Barry O'Farrell introduced the lockout laws in 2014 after the death of teenager Daniel Christie from a one-punch attack in Kings Cross, just metres from the spot Thomas Kelly, 18, was killed in 2012. St Vincent's hospital treated both teenagers.