Author: Nicole

The Story of Fyre Fest

The Story of Fyre Fest

‘It was an absolute Fyre Festival.’ Before Miami contestants were enlisted to save the world, another group signed up in Montreal. But where were the cameras? This, from a Canadian news anchor in 2014:

On Sunday morning, I sat alone watching the news in front of a television screen in my living room. I had been sitting there for over an hour, waiting for a special segment on the news. Suddenly, the camera’s zoom lens flashed around to reveal a small group of Canadians lined up behind me. They were in the same spot I was in: at my dining room table with my laptop.

Each of them was a member of a team participating in what was then a massive Fyre Fest party in the Bahamas.

And they were all sitting there in front of me saying the same thing: ‘It was an absolute Fyre Fest.’

I have no memory of having heard those words before, and for the first time, I realized there was a distinct lack of footage that showed the people who were actually there.

This was a major reason why the story was a big story, one that made the world pay attention to a single, seemingly unlikely event in the Bahamas.

All the people who were there told a different story. And this story was not the one that was told.

A quick history of Fyre, of course.

On the morning of August 1, one year ago, an 18-year-old boy, Billy McFarland, decided to take a much-needed trip to the Bahamas. As you might recall, this week was a holiday week for many young Canadians, and for the most part, they weren’t doing anything.

But Billy was doing something: he was getting a job at a company called Prestige Hotels & Resorts.

And while his Fyre trip was supposedly going to be an all-inclusive trip with his roommates and their friends, Prestige had other plans. The company had booked a luxury resort for a one-night-only event that included a beach party, a wedding, and a high-end performance by ‘The Weeknd,’ an artist famous for his hits like ‘Starboy’ and ‘Reminder.’

The hotel in question was called

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