I watched that Netflix documentary about the fiasco and had a hard time finding figures to empathize with other than a handful of vendors and contractors who got screwed over. I know this marks me as an out-of-touch oldster but I’m still weirded out by the idea that “influencer” is considered a legitimate job description or that people would pay so much money to go to an event where such people hang out.
The whole scene is off-putting to me, and the appeal of sleazeballs like Billy McFarland is an enigma.
I don’t know… an exclusive music festival on a “private” island. Seems like the idea sells itself to most young 20 somethings, unsure why this isn’t a common thing.
In this case, because the first one of these by this promoter was grifting bullshit and he served time in jail for what he did. Whether something like this is interesting and feasible to anyone is besides the point. This guy has a proven track recording of fraud.
Reminder that classic con artists usually kept a list of all of their historical marks, just so they could revisit them.
People don’t get wiser and learn from their mistakes; the best predictor of who will fall for a con is whether or not they’ve fallen for one before. Fool me once? Shame on you. Fool me twice? I’ll be a recurring revenue stream.
“And there was a certain bent appeal in the notion of running a savage burn on one Las Vegas hotel and then just wheeling across town and checking into another”
HST - Feat and Loathing in Las Vegas
You know, if I were running the same scam twice, I think I’d consider switching up the name. Is “Fyre Festival” really something some people want more of?
Ja Rule was actually “cleared of wrongdoing” re Fyre Festival. In general, you’re of course correct, but I think this is more of a “rich vs poor” thing.
"I mean yes, yes we’ve got to find out what people want from fire, I mean how do they relate to it, the image … which is precisely the sort of thing we need to know, I mean do people want fire that can be fitted nasally?" The Hitch-Hiker’s Guide to the Galaxy (Fit the Sixth) – Douglas Adams
I’m going to go out on a limb and guess that the kind of person who buys a ticket to this is the same person who thinks Bored Ape is still a good investment (or that it ever was, really).
I feel like there would actually be an honest, but small, chunk of change to be made by selling tickets to “Fyre Fest 2” with a nudge-nudge, wink-wink understanding that this one isn’t going to happen either, and the tickets are just a funny novelty item.
Print them on tyvek or something, slightly psychedelic ticket art, fake lineup, throw a little hologram on there. People could whip them out at a bar and be like “I’ve already got my tickets, man” as a little ironic/self-deprecating joke.
