
Luxury Music Festival Turns Out to Be Half-Built Scene of Chaos - ljk
http://www.npr.org/sections/thetwo-way/2017/04/28/526019457/paradise-lost-luxury-music-festival-turns-out-to-be-half-built-scene-of-chaos
======
maxander
For everyone who hates the "plug-and-play" trips to Burning Man set up for
rich kids, this story is the schadenfreude of the year. It turns out that the
logistics of throwing giant festivals in remote locations are difficult! Who
would have guessed?

I look forward to the deeper investigative reporting on precisely how that
mess worked out as badly as it did, but the combination of promise-vs-reality
mismatch and the rough PR afterwards suggests incompetence on all levels.

~~~
droithomme
"It turns out that the logistics of throwing giant festivals in remote
locations are difficult!"

I agree with your statement, but I'm not even sure it applies here. The
organizers were charging up to $400,000 a ticket (!) including promises of
chartered planes and geodesic domes. They provided none of it, the location is
described as "dangerous", and it appears no performers showed up. But they did
provide some sort of commercial flights back, which probably cost about $199
each. Sounds like a profitable scheme, particularly if the organizers are
basically unknown and now simple disappear with the cash.

~~~
ethbro
As someone who has been to the Exumas, you're talking about small, non-
volcanic populated Bahamian islands.

I doubt the infrastructure was up to the standards of the club scene, but it's
not like there aren't medical facilities, food, or water on Great Exuma.

Even dropping a larger number of festival attenders (on an island with a
normal population of 7,000), we're talking "dangerous" conditions in terms of
"there's no air conditioned room for me to wait in" and "why hasn't anyone
offered me champagne and caviar yet"?

These kids need to learn to appreciate the beauty around them (it's an
absolutely _gorgeous_ place) and quit bitching that they don't have everything
handed to them on a silver spoon.

Or in other words, try traveling instead of being a tourist.

~~~
GuB-42
Getting thousands of unprepared people on an island with a limited food
supply, not enough lodging and inadequate security is very dangerous. These
are the ideal conditions to cause panic.

In fact the article mentions that some the partygoers were all like "fuck that
shit and let's just have fun" but changed their mind after assessing the
situation.

~~~
ethbro
It's the Bahamas. I've never been on an island where the local fishing
industry (incl neighboring islands) couldn't easily scale to feed a few
thousand. Demand rather than supply limited. And the locals are likely happily
selling fresh catch to tourists at $75 / fish.

Lodging, sleep on the beach for a couple nights. This time of year, 80s every
day. 70s every night.

Security? If the security problem is the tourists themselves, then maybe they
don't deserve to spend time in paradise.

> _" At first, she and her friends wanted to make the best of a bad situation,
> she said, "but then we saw how it started getting dangerous." She said the
> site didn't have enough security, lights, or food._

> _" You were promised chargers for your phone — did not get that," Busier
> said. "You were promised food — we were like starving. And you were promised
> safety, you were promised to be taken care of, you were promised an
> experience of a lifetime. And yes, it was quite the experience, but not in a
> positive way."_

I recognize that the article is somewhat of a hit piece. But if the above is
the attendees making the best of a bad situation, then I expressed about as
much sympathy as I have.

------
walterbell
From Bahamian paper, [http://www.tribune242.com/news/2017/apr/28/tribune-
comment-f...](http://www.tribune242.com/news/2017/apr/28/tribune-comment-fyre-
festival-organisers-showed-di/)

 _"... those who met with the organisers of the Fyre Festival shared that the
timeframe was far too short for such an ambitious event ... organisers were
again advised to reschedule the event to avoid competing with the famous 60
and more-year-old George Town regatta ... this Regatta is the highlight of the
George Town social calendar. All hotel rooms, transportation, taxis and
majority of the rental houses are booked years in advance for this week.
Clearly, this would pose a logistical nightmare and preclude any additional
tourists or locals from attending such an event as Fyre Festival."_

------
alistproducer2
The Reddit dedicated to this showed there was an article in the huffpo and a
Twitter account (something like @fyrefraud) that have been screaming for
months that this festival was an obvious scam. If you know what to look for, a
lot of outcomes are not some giant mystery. In isolation, human behavior is
actually quite predictable; only in the aggregate does it get difficult to
predict.

Edit: I went through my browser history and the Twitter handle is correct.the
article was actually on BuzzFeed but it's been scrubbed since last night. The
author's name is Madeline Scott and the title started with "is fyre festival
the next big music event or..." Maybe there's a cahe of the article somewhere?

~~~
oomkiller
Archive of article: [http://archive.is/ts6kN](http://archive.is/ts6kN)

~~~
retube
Both Sky broadband and 02 mobile are blocking this domain saying it's dodgy

~~~
radicalbyte
Dude, you really need to use a VPN. That's the create firewall of Great
Britain at work.

They have to block archive.is because it's very so slightly socialist..

~~~
regularfry
Or hop to an ISP that doesn't filter. They do exist.

~~~
vertex-four
Or, y'know, disable your filter. Sky's configuration panel is here -
[https://broadbandshield.sky.com/](https://broadbandshield.sky.com/) \- O2's,
iirc, requires you to go to an O2 shop with your ID.

~~~
regularfry
Heh, small world. I work for Sky, and my team very recently took over
technical responsibility for that exact site. Nevertheless, it's worth knowing
that outside the big 4, there are ISPs which _on principle_ don't even require
that step. People can fall into the trap of believing that _all_ UK consumer
internet access has a ThinkOfTheChildren filter in place by default, but
that's just not true.

~~~
vertex-four
Sure, AAISP don't even provide a filter iirc, though are a lot more expensive
than some of the more mainstream ISPs. I think Zen Internet don't either, but
again, expensive.

------
Theodores
Each year there is guaranteed to be a 'winter wonderland' event with Santa,
the Elves and everything else Christmas, only for it to go the way of the Fyre
Festival and become newsworthy. Typical headlines will involve the elves sat
around smoking with no snow anywhere on site and the general appearance of the
'wonderland' being more like a refugee camp.

Some recent years, found with zero Google-fu:

2013:

[http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/uknews/10518992/Winter-
Wonde...](http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/uknews/10518992/Winter-Wonderland-
in-Milton-Keynes-cancelled-after-complaints-over-ice-rink-with-no-ice.html)

'Poundland Santa' \- funny!!!

2014:

[http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/celebritynews/11248745/Laure...](http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/celebritynews/11248745/Laurence-
Llewelyn-Bowens-winter-wonderland-told-to-shut.html)

'a visit to Father Christmas will never be the same again...'

2008:

[http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-1090931/Furious-
pare...](http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-1090931/Furious-parents-
attack-Santa-elves-tempers-fray-Winter-blunderland-theme-park.html)

'Challenging: The 'Nativity scene' could only be reached across a muddy field'

2016:

[http://www.mirror.co.uk/news/uk-news/bad-santa-gets-sack-
smo...](http://www.mirror.co.uk/news/uk-news/bad-santa-gets-sack-
smoking-9304456)

'One mum who visited the Christmas gala event in Cumbria, which cost £25 for a
family of four, said her kids had more fun walking home'

Clearly this is a list that gets added to every year and I am wondering
whether this would make an interesting day out, to go to a real life version
of Banksy's take on a theme park.

The failed festival is in the same league however I think there is added
reason for failure. Back in the day of illegal raves there was no option of
failure because people would bring their own entertainment (yes, probably
drugs) and be prepared for no facilities except for a sound system or two.
Events were participatory, people got on with it and didn't wait around
expecting to be entertained.

~~~
strathmeyer
It's an old scam, Bob Dylan sung a song about it in the sixties called
"Talkin’ Bear Mountain Picnic Massacre Blues"

------
downandout
This festival has ignited a Twitter war between the haves and the have nots.
One particularly tone deaf tweet (if you read her entire feed over the last 24
hours, you will understand why poor/middle class people dislike most
outrageously rich people and vice versa):

[https://twitter.com/storeyfrizzell/status/858091444275302400](https://twitter.com/storeyfrizzell/status/858091444275302400)

~~~
freditup
I think it's a parody account, right?

> I'd rather be on a yacht out of touch with reality. We all our preferences;
> some just are unable to have them

> Just bc I'm rich doesn't mean I don't have problems. In fact I've been
> devastated about the furniture my decorator chose

> I'm funemloyed, much better than actually being employed. Try it
> sometime...if you can

Regardless, in general, disliking people just because they're rich seems
unhelpful and a quick way to jealously and discontentment. Being angered by
wealthy individuals who actively abuse those with less is an entirely
different story though.

~~~
downandout
I looked through it and it appears not to be. My first impression was similar
to yours, but all was normal on the account until the Fyre Festival and she
began complaining about the conditions and how she was having problems getting
her father's jet in to pick her up. Friends of hers also had private jets come
get them. The things you posted were in response to criticism of her wealth
and I think at that point she became angry and started going into full snob-
mode.

I didn't say that I dislike rich people, I was just saying that a mutual
hatred between classes seems to be common in today's America. Her recent
Twitter feed puts that on full display.

~~~
bennettfeely
> I did not go to the #fyrefestival. I'm shocked the majority of people didn't
> catch on to the fact that we were trolling.

[https://twitter.com/storeyfrizzell/status/858562982627786752](https://twitter.com/storeyfrizzell/status/858562982627786752)

~~~
downandout
Yeah, just posted. My point still stands, there was a lot of hate being spewed
at legitimate attendees. It figures that I choose to single out one that turns
out to be an authentic looking troll that reveals it just after I mention it,
but that's just my bad luck.

------
jodrellblank
If you like reading about festival fails, on a smaller, less-grand, scale
there's 'pizza-and-music' festival _MySliceFest_ of last year -
[http://www.methodsunsound.com/myslicefest-london-
review/](http://www.methodsunsound.com/myslicefest-london-review/)

~~~
sanswork
Toronto seems to have about 5 food festival failures every summer. The last
one I remember being everywhere on social media was a grilled cheese one. But
there are numerous food truck ones where almost everyone runs out of food or
line ups are multi-hour affairs.

I'd thought it an impossible task to put on a good food based festival for a
long time but Gilroy did a pretty good job with their Garlic festival. The
trick seemed to be have about 5 stalls for every vendor and stick them in
opposite edges so if the line is long at the Garlic Ice Cream booth you just
keep walking around the edge a bit to the next booth from the same company
selling the same stuff.

~~~
sndean
> where almost everyone runs out of food or line ups are multi-hour affairs.

Yeah, this seems to be getting more common (maybe because the people running
the festivals make a nice profit?).

I was at a hot wings festival recently. In a two-hour line for 4 wings. Then
they ran out of wings, beer, and all liquids, including water. It ended up
being ~$10/wing, 1 wing/hour.

~~~
DonHopkins
I heard about that one. Paul McCartney didn't show up because his band was on
the run, so he flew like an eagle. But fortunately a mellifluous Chinese
vocalist showed up and sang a song. [1]

[1]
[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=W6g_jP00I38](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=W6g_jP00I38)

------
nsxwolf
I love the pictures. It looks like they built a terrifying hellscape in the
middle of paradise.

------
erik_landerholm
Other than the fact this story makes us all giggle...who cares?

~~~
zzalpha
Well, this is a great example of how not to deliver a minimum _viable_
product...

~~~
protomyth
And it shows not to believe your own hype no matter how much you generate.
Hype doesn't deliver the MVP, logistics and execution deliver the MVP.

Although people paying that kind of money want a tad bit more than minimum.

[edit] I really don't want to make fun of other people's misfortune, but I
couldn't help but think that would have made an awesome setting for a sequel
to _Tucker & Dale vs. Evil_.

------
Tunecrew
The number one issue with this festival for those of us in the Caribbean (and
those of us who are also involved in the entertainment industry) is that this
casts a very negative image on festivals here in general.

This is in spite of the fact that throughout the region, much larger and more
elaborate events occur frequently, e.g. carnival in Trinidad (and everywhere
else), St. Lucia Jazz Fest, Reggae Sumfest, SXM, countless large sporting
events like the ICC Cricket World Cup, etc.

I'm performing at a new one called Tmrw.Tday in Negril in two weeks - luckily
the Fyre thing happened too late to affect ticket sales for that one I think.

------
Animats
As a followup, the New York Post reports that the Fyre company is facing an
employee revolt. If the paychecks aren't delivered today, a mass exodus is
expected.[1] The company may not make it to Monday.

[1] [http://nypost.com/2017/05/04/fyre-festival-organizer-is-
faci...](http://nypost.com/2017/05/04/fyre-festival-organizer-is-facing-an-
employee-revolt/)

------
m3kw9
It happens all the time even in small scale. One of the food fests for
example, when I got there, there were foods that had nothing to do with the
theme and they started mark up prices on the spot because there wasn't enough.
Never mind I had to pay to get in on the first place and the food was
horrible.

------
bane
This sounds like a repeat of the Dashcon fiasco. Complete with overpromised
celebrities who never show up, captive audience, and underdelivered
entertainment venues.

------
cmoscoso
what's the relationship with HN?

~~~
gt2
Fyre app is tech startup, also Fyre festival was a project, which probably has
a lot of things in common with other types of projects.

------
sigi45
Why do i have to read about some stupid rich shit failed luxury music festival
on reddit, hackernews, at some random website and a german newspaper?

who cares?

:(

Rich people got disappointed, okay.

~~~
heyalexej
Are you saying that there's a certain level of wealth that makes getting
scammed okay? Just so people can prepare themselves to not get too "rich",
what is that threshold?

~~~
al-xss
Obviously, the threshold is $1 richer than me

