National Post (National Edition)
The life and times of Billy Mcfarland
THE GUY BEHIND LAST YEAR’S DISASTROUS FYRE FESTIVAL WON’T STOP, CAN’T STOP
Last week, 27-yearold Billy Mcfarland was arrested and charged for allegedly selling fake tickets to a smattering of luxury events, including the Met Gala and Coachella music festival, through an elaborate scam. He may not be as well-known as Charles Ponzi or Bernie Madoff, but McFarland is well on his way to becoming a world-famous fraudster.
Before the arrest, the American “business owner” and “CEO” is probably best known for founding Fyre Media, the company behind last year’s disastrous Fyre Festival, which fell apart due to disorganization and, uh, no musical performers.
The son of real-estate developers, Mcfarland long claimed he started and sold three companies before graduating from high school in 2010 — one of which involved renting overseas server space to porn sites. According to a source quoted in a 2017 Vanity Fair profile, “At the beginning, he was this young kid, from a nice family out in Jersey. He kind of progressed into somebody who was scamming and lying. It’s sad. You know, when they come to New York, the bright lights, some people can fake it till they make it, and other guys, well ...”
Mcfarland dropped out of Pennsylvania’s Bucknell University, and founded social media platform Spling in 2011, which functioned like an updated Myspace. But when Google+ hit the scene shortly after, Spling fizzled, and Mcfarland moved on to his next enterprise in 2013: Magnises, an exclusive card for the frat-boy set. The word, by the way, means nothing, as Mcfarland himself admitted to the New York Post: “The name is made up, but it sounds grand, doesn’t it?” It’s the sort of theme he’d continue shlepping throughout his short career.
Despite interest from financiers, Magnises never evolved past being an access card for an invite-only New York City club where, for an annual US$250 fee, members could party and drink all day long in a Greenwich Village townhouse outfitted with an open bar. Mcfarland claimed his enterprise had 1,200 members in 2014, according to Fortune and, two years later, he said it was up to 30,000 and, yet another two months later, 100,000.
But as Mcfarland attempted to expand elsewhere in the city — rumour had it the company was simply thrown out of the townhouse — he was hit with over US$60,000 worth of damages by the landlord, and members began to lose interest as he attempted to bribe them with everything from Hamilton tickets to international flights. But tickets would never arrive and flights were never booked. Eventually, Mcfarland, too, lost interest and Magnises collapsed.
On to the next venture, Mcfarland launched Fyre Media in 2015, which he claimed was worth US$90 million, according to Bloomberg, but actually only earned US$60,000.
It debuted, in partnership with Ja Rule of all people, with its ill-fated “luxury music festival” in the summer of 2017, targeting a similar “exclusive” audience to Magnises. It was promoted via a social media campaign that featured the likes of model Bella Hadid, Kendall Jenner and hundreds of Instagram influencers who were paid to be the “faces” of the festival.
The lies were abundant. There was no private island called “Fyre Cay,” no private planes from Miami, no concierge service or V.I.P. amenities, no Migos and Blink-182, no caterers and no celebrities, either. The festival was meant to promote Fyre’s new talent booking app, a goal that was lost amid the controversy, when thousands of wellto-do Millennials hit the Bahamas beach expecting to be surrounded by celebs and see a host of performers Mcfarland’s team had promised. Instead, the festival collapsed due to poor organization, a lack of food, amenities and was blasted all over social media. It was ultimately cancelled as soon as it began, leaving thousands stranded.
In March, Mcfarland pleaded guilty to fraud and faking documents to pull in over US$26 million for the festival. He faces another dozen lawsuits in conjunction with the Fyre Festival, according to Fortune, including one class-action suit alongside Ja Rule, filed by festival-goers who are calling the entire endeavour a Ponzi scheme.
Notably, Assistant U.S. Attorney Kristy Greenberg declared Mcfarland’s career a “pattern of deception” — one that continued even after he began his wait for a June 21 trial. This week’s run-in with the law surrounds NYC VIP Access, the name of the ticket business he launched shortly after the Fyre Festival disaster, and ran until March of this year.
For this particular scam, Mcfarland is facing new charges, of wire fraud and money laundering. He could face up to 40 years in prison — but given his history, one must wonder if even that will stop him from yet another highly questionable venture.
THE NAME IS MADE UP, BUT IT SOUNDS GRAND, DOESN’T IT?