
U.S. Marshals Service online auction – Fyre festival fraud scheme - aranibatta
https://txauction.com/auctions/911/
======
nrmitchi
I first thought these were bids for lots of items, like... cases of the item.
Am I mistaken that these are actually bids on a single, quantity=1, item?

It's actually impressive if they're auctioning off failed-festival merch at
Supreme prices.

~~~
tyingq
I sort of wonder if someone is trolling them with a credit card that's going
to be invalid before the auction ends. Who bids $500 for a single hat you can
reproduce on any custom hat site?

~~~
evolve2k
I just assumed it was rich influencer fashion types who were keen to own a
piece of infamy and had the disposal wealth to not over think it and just bid
on homepage items.

“Hey is that hat from Fyre festival?” “Yeah it’s real, I got it online for
$500”

~~~
aasasd
It's like I'm again hearing the jokes about Russian ‘nouveau riches’ of the
90s:

 _— Bro, check out this tie I 've bought for 500 bucks._

 _— Dude, you were swindled like a loser. I 've bought one just like that next
door, but for 700 dollars._

------
S_A_P
Ive seen one of the documentaries about this festival. IMO, I dont think the
perpetrators set out to defraud anyone. I think they were just completely
inept at what they were doing. They(Billy McFarland) got in over their head
and realized way too late that they were. I suppose the case can be made that
they did realize early enough that they could have called it off before the
dumpster fyre that it was happened. Not doing so seems solid grounds for a
fraud case. I think that it is also possible that if he had admitted failure
there is a chance he could have salvaged the event and had it later.

That said I don't think it was an intent to defraud people or else they would
not have even tried to put the event together. Why would all of this merch
have been created if they just wanted to bilk investors and festival
attendees? This is hubris and ignorance more than fraud.

~~~
55555
Watch the Netflix documentary, and pay close attention to what he does after
his failed festival. Either he's a scammer or Netflix is, as he seems to be
running a new business where he sells tickets to events he doesn't have
tickets for, and for which he has no way of getting them, and then ghosts the
buyers.

I think he didn't really set out to defraud anyone, but he has an incredible
ego and sense of entitlement, and he got used to living a jetsetting lifestyle
and didn't want to downgrade, so he defrauded people (in his newer business,
after the festival). Given how naturally he did it, I'd be surprised if he
hadn't been running ticket scams on and off for years.

~~~
walrus01
What the Netflix documentary leaves out, significantly, is the involvement of
the "fuckjerry" advertising/PR agency people in both promoting the festival
and then later contributing to the documentary itself.

google "fuckjerry fyre festival"

[https://decider.com/2019/01/15/fyre-festival-fuck-
jerry/](https://decider.com/2019/01/15/fyre-festival-fuck-jerry/)

[https://www.forbes.com/sites/alexandrasternlicht/2019/10/24/...](https://www.forbes.com/sites/alexandrasternlicht/2019/10/24/fyre-
proof-the-sudden-fall-and-swift-re-emergence-of-fckjerrys-elliot-
tebele/#6855eaa64e85)

~~~
btgeekboy
It's been a while, but I thought the Hulu documentary included a decent amount
about fuckjerry. Might be worth comparing.

~~~
pests
I'm pretty sure the Hulu one was made by fuckjerry. That's why they were a
prominent interviewee during it and also profiting again.

~~~
btgeekboy
I only saw the Hulu one, and I didn't remember it being very kind to
fuckjerry. According to Wikipedia, Jerry Productions (aka fuckjerry) was the
Netflix one. Kinda glad I didn't see it now.

[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fyre_(film)](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fyre_\(film\))

~~~
pests
Oh thanks. Honestly I've always confused the two so thanks for clarifying
which one was made by them. I've only seen that one to be honest.

I also know one of the two also did a paid interview with Billy McFaland so it
was another instance of him profiting off this. The other declining to have
him due to principle. I again forget which.

Agreed, I was disappointed that I watched the one supporting that media
company.

I'm pretty sure I saw evidence or at least rumor that fuckjerry knew it was
going to be a colossal fuck up and continued along with it just for money and
the making of movie.

------
rootsudo
[https://www.etsy.com/listing/834383864/](https://www.etsy.com/listing/834383864/)

Here you go guys, you're welcome.

------
strstr
Oh man these are collector’s items. I’d love to have one of the hats. Not $500
want, but I’d probably have spent double the price of the hat on them. Maybe
$50-60 or something.

~~~
evan_
you could probably just print one on RedBubble. I don't think anyone will stop
you.

~~~
thelean12
Then it's not collectible or particularly interesting. That's just a hat.

~~~
Galaxity
Who could tell the difference?

~~~
verroq
People who buy collectibles are going to ask for proof of authenticity and the
chain of custody.

~~~
throwawaygh
The value of these sorts of things will drop precipitously with time. Who's
going to remember/care about fyre in 20 years?

~~~
khazhoux
"Bob, I wanna show you something, hang on... OK, here it is.. Remember that
Fyre festival a few year ago?"

"The scam thing?"

"Yes! This... is a real Fyre merch hat!! Got it at auction."

"Huh."

------
sebastien_b
My work is having a “clear the office out before the move” auction - I can try
for a few macMinis for about $200 total, or help fund a police department for
Fyre swag, single item.

Tough choice.

~~~
rsa25519
I assume you're being sarcastic, but a Fyre hat sounds very badass. If I had
the disposable income, I'd love one

~~~
Galaxity
It's not badass.

~~~
bottlelion
It is badass.

~~~
sebastien_b
Maybe $1 badass.

But not $500.

------
edsouza
Fyre Festival information:
[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fyre_Festival](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fyre_Festival)

~~~
msla
Internet Historian has a video on the subject:

[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UBPg5ftCMv8](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UBPg5ftCMv8)

------
webel0
I also think that most of these “lots” are just for one item.

However, I think that the bids are probably mostly earnest.

As streetware a lot of this could probably be considered collector’s items
among the hype beast crowd. The prices seem to be in a range similar to
supreme and similar.

~~~
atwebb
This must be how people feel when I talk about databases, I am speculating on
meanings from context.

------
ogre_codes
I was thinking it might be fun to have a cap or a shirt from this... then I
saw the prices. $500 for a ball cap?

I'm wondering if anyone is actually going to pay for this stuff or if it's
just a bunch of K-Pop fans driving up prices only to abandon them.

~~~
kevin_thibedeau
Just have one made. Nobody's going to protect the trademark.

~~~
cwkoss
Nobody is going to come after you for a single item run for personal
noncommercial use anyways - even litigious active trademarks

------
Animats
The endgame:

    
    
        Name: WILLIAM MCFARLAND
        Register Number: 91186-054
        Age: 28
        Race: White
        Sex: Male
        Release Date: 08/30/2023
        Located At: FCI Elkton

~~~
rsa25519
What's this?

~~~
Melting_Harps
> What's this?

His bio/profile and location of incarceration. I'll also add he tested
positive for Corona virus [1] after confirming the prison location he was in.

1: [https://nypost.com/2020/07/04/fyre-fest-fraudster-billy-
mcfa...](https://nypost.com/2020/07/04/fyre-fest-fraudster-billy-mcfarland-
contracts-covid-19-in-prison/)

------
aaron695
They were pretty close to a billion $

From the docos the interesting thing is they seemed like they almost would
have became Cameo.

Just like Riot-E also almost became 100 millionaires through their outrageous
fake it till you make it
[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=g0lrIi0ce5E](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=g0lrIi0ce5E)
(NSFW)

------
anonymfus
I wonder if a merch for other fraud schemes existed how much would it cost and
who would buy it? Imagine Bernie Madoff's t-shorts.

~~~
mguerville
So I happen to know a bit of that world. I’m a collector of memorabilia of
failed capitalist endeavors. The point others have made is very true about
merch being hard to authenticate when you could just recreate on any custom T
shirt / hat / mug site. But for some companies, Enron, Pets.com, and a couple
others, merch still commands a high price (not Fyre level though). Personally
I prefer to seek more rare and “inside baseball” artefacts but in some cases
merch is the best I can do (or an autographed book).

~~~
gen220
My dad still has a ton of Netscape, Novell, and mp3.com branded gear from when
he worked there in the 90s. The last time I went home I saw it just laying
around in the garage with his bootleg cassettes and my childhood beach toys.

Now some of it makes an awesome talk piece at the office, or at least it did
when we still had one. :)

~~~
mguerville
If your dad is open to it, these three happen to be among the ones i have
never been able to find anything (mp3.com especially) so I’d be interested

They would fit nicely :
[http://mattmg83.github.io/cynicalcapitalist/portfolio.html](http://mattmg83.github.io/cynicalcapitalist/portfolio.html)

------
shadowprofile77
These prices are insane! And the weird thing is that the site's showing
multiple (in some cases dozens) of bids for items like single perfectly
ordinary, even boring looking T shirts for over $100 dollars. Who'd be bidding
at these prices and why? (Note: I have absolutely no knowledge of what the
Fyre festival is/was or its relevance to anything, but even then, what makes
it momentous enough for these prices?)

~~~
Doxin
For some context: fyre festival was supposed to be a high end luxury all-
inclusive festival. Essentially everything in the planning -- aside perhaps
from the advertising -- went poorly to the extreme. In the end all that
managed to actually get arranged was the flight to the island location. Once
there people more or less found themselves stranded in a tent camp with no
food and too few mattresses instead of the luxury festival they were promised.

There's a couple documentaries on the whole thing which I can recommend
watching, it's almost impressive how monumentally poor everything got planned.
The whole thing of course strikes a chord with the ironic-fashion crowd.

------
tootie
Does the SDNY keep this money or does it go to restitution?

~~~
nickphx
Goes to the victims.

~~~
djsumdog
I was wondering that too. I'm glad, although I'm guessing it won't be that
much compared to how much they defrauded people. I'm guessing everyone might
get like $50 back for a $1k ticket?

~~~
adjkant
The people who bought the tickets are likely not the victims it's going to, or
at least I hope not. Watch the Hulu documentary if you want more context.

~~~
djsumdog
I've seen both documentaries. I know that one women who owned the restaurant
and provided a bunch of workers did have a gofundme that helped get back a lot
of what she lost.

------
londons_explore
Where does the revenue from this auction go?

Presumably it's given to creditors of the fyre festival? What if there is an
excess?

~~~
sumtechguy
One of a few possible places. If the festival has fines they can not pay. It
goes towards that any leftover would be credited back to the people who were
fined. If it is just seized material that was abandoned or seized in the act
of criminality then back into the treasury or the marshals general funds.

------
abeppu
It's been pointed out that there are identical items with very different bids.
Maybe someone with knowledge of game theory or mechanism design or whatever
can tell me: What's the "right" way (or ways?) to auction off multiple
identical items? Top k bids win?

~~~
wmf
[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vickrey%E2%80%93Clarke%E2%80%9...](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vickrey%E2%80%93Clarke%E2%80%93Groves_auction)

~~~
sbierwagen
I was going to remark on that ugly URL, only to discover that using en-dashes,
which have to be percent-encoded in URLs, is _official Wikipedia policy!_
[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Manual_of_Style#Dash...](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Manual_of_Style#Dashes)
How unbelivably braindead.

~~~
michaelt
Hacker News and Wikipedia render links containing 毛泽东 correctly, but browsers
copy-and-paste them as
[https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=%E6%AF%9B%E6%B3%B...](https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=%E6%AF%9B%E6%B3%BD%E4%B8%9C)
and somehow it's Wikipedia's fault browsers do that?

~~~
sbierwagen
It is most _certainly_ Wikipedia's fault that their style guide requires –,
Unicode EN DASH U+2013, rather than -, Unicode HYPHEN-MINUS U+002D out of some
misguided desire for typographical "correctness". That is 100% Wikipedia's
choice, and it ruins their URLs, for no good reason.

------
alasdair_
I wonder at what point the logo and other IP goes up for sale.

Also, if those caps get major media attention, I can see them going for
thousands of dollars to a celebrity (someone like Kanye West). I’d bet wearing
the cap alone would generate several articles and other press coverage.

------
dmschulman
hacker news: "if left unchecked, the powers of the federal government will
prove quite onerous"

also hacker news: "i need this hat" [pays $700 to u.s. marshalls]

------
bmitc
Who gets the money from such an auction? Does it act as repayment for those
defrauded? Does it go to the government?

------
Archit3ch
Fraud associations aside, Fyre would be a great name for a startup.

~~~
saddestcatever
They tried!

"Fyre Media" was the talent-boooking app/startup that Billy was trying to get
off the ground in parallel with the festival :P

[https://www.crunchbase.com/organization/fyre-media-
inc](https://www.crunchbase.com/organization/fyre-media-inc)

> Fyre Media, an app that ostensibly allows customers to book performing
> artists for private events, and the Fyre Festival was intended to be an
> extension of that brand.

[https://www.vice.com/en_ca/article/qvz5m3/fyre-
festivals-25-...](https://www.vice.com/en_ca/article/qvz5m3/fyre-
festivals-25-year-old-organizer-this-is-the-worst-day-of-my-life)

------
m3kw9
They robbing people again with those prices.

~~~
Reedx
Except it's an auction...

It seems people are just determined to keep throwing money into the Fyre.

~~~
shadowgovt
This would be more surprising to me if I hadn't seen the guys who make Cards
Against Humanity get a bunch of money thrown at them to dig a hole a few years
back.

------
monadic2
Where does the money go?

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mrnobody_67
$400 for a hat?

~~~
bravoetch
The money apparently goes to the victims. Maybe people are being charitable.

~~~
rjmunro
If it's anything like bankruptcy in the UK, it will go to the subset of the
"victims" who have the best lawyers.

Fees for Lawyers and accountants dealing with the bankruptcy will be deducted
first. Any money owed to banks will be paid next. If there is any left, it
will go to pay any taxes owed to the government or the local authorities.
Eventually whatever is left will be divided proportionally between whoever is
left owed money, but this will probably be a tiny fraction of the amount they
are owed, if anything at all.

------
barkingcat
the auction is also a fraud meant to recoup funds from the festival fraud...

