Billy
The black metal card hustle that became Magnises
Broke and jealous of an entrepreneur's Amex Centurion card, Billy McFarland bought blank black metal cards and a credit-card copier off Alibaba, copied his own Chase debit card onto one, and sold the status cards to entrepreneurs at his WeWork. That stunt became Magnises.
“So I went back to my WeWork office, went online to Alibaba before Alibaba was really like a mainstream thing, uh, particularly like in New York, in the US, bought these black metal cards and bought a credit card copier. They kind of came in the mail, took my Chase Blue debit card, copied it onto this black card, went to the pizza place across the street from the WeWork. Guy was treating me like I was royalty. Went back into the office and just sold these cards to all the entrepreneurs in the WeWork office. And then Magnesis was born.”
Number
Magnises did $11-12M in revenue over three years
McFarland's status-card membership business Magnises generated $11-12 million in revenue over three years before he cannibalized its customer base to fund Fyre Festival, taking the company down with the festival.
$11.5M
Total revenue over three years · USD
“So Magnesis did total like $11-12-ish million in revenue over 3 years. And my biggest mistake was getting distracted by Fyre and the Fyre Festival.”
Framework
Sell an inaccessible tangible asset, then build a business on top
McFarland's repeatable playbook: take a tangible good or service that a target audience can't otherwise access (a black card, a Manhattan townhouse, a private island), give it to customers so they feel they own it, and use that as the launchpad for the real business.
“So all of my marketing strategy came down to taking a tangible good or service that wasn't available to a certain audience, giving it to them, making them feel like it's theirs and they own it, and using that to build a business.”
Steal thisLead with one scarce, tangible asset your audience can't get elsewhere, hand it to them as if it's theirs, then build the product on top of that loyalty.
Take
Lying, not logistics, is what doomed Fyre Festival
McFarland argues the festival failed because he was too scared to admit he was in over his head; had he told his well-connected backers the truth, they'd have brought in real festival operators to execute it.
“I think lying and unable to show weaknesses made the festival fail. And I truly believe that my backers at the time were well connected and smart enough where I came to them and said, hey, look guys, we did this great marketing campaign, but I have no idea what the fuck I'm doing. They would've found like the best festival people in the world to come and actually execute this. But I was so scared to show that I couldn't handle it that I kept saying everything is great and everything is perfect.”
Take
Honest 'bring a sleeping bag' marketing could have saved Fyre
McFarland believes if Fyre had been marketed honestly as a rough, figure-it-out adventure with A-list artists and a beautiful island, attendees would have felt like they owned the adventure, like early Burning Man. The aspirational marketing both sold tickets and guaranteed failure.
“Like, hey guys, I can't figure out the logistics. I can't afford to build like 500 houses, but I somehow came up with the $5 million for the artists. We have these great people, we have this great island, like bring a sleeping bag and figure this shit out. I think if that mindset shift was marketed, people would've been a) more excited and they would've been like, felt like they're owning the adventure and it would've been almost like how early Burning Man years were. And like the marketing like killed me at the end. Like the marketing sold tickets, but it also made it fail.”
Story
Waking up to raise $50K-$4M before 2pm just to survive
McFarland describes living without ever zooming out: he'd go to sleep broke and wake up knowing he had to raise a specific amount, sometimes $50K, sometimes $4M, by early afternoon to wire it out and survive the day.
“And it got to the point where I would go to sleep with no money in the bank, wake up and know that like that day I had to raise a certain dollar amount just to survive. And some days it was $50 grand, some days it was $4 million. So I'd wake up at, you know, 9:00 AM and know that I have until 2:00 PM to get X dollars in the bank to then rewire it out before the, before the day ended.”
Number
Fyre burned roughly $40M in six months
McFarland estimates he spent close to $40 million over the six-month run-up to Fyre Festival, raising money from a different angle every single day, against a festival budget that was supposed to be $10 million.
$40M
Total spend over six months · USD
“I would say in this 6-month period, it was probably closer to $40 over 6 months.”
Idea
Interactive island livestream where viewers pay to change reality
McFarland's post-prison Pirate concept: rig a hotel/island with 360 cameras, track talent and 'toys' in real time, and let livestream viewers pay micro-amounts to trigger real-world actions, from buying an artist a drink to chumming the water near sharks.
“But the idea is to take, like, a one-to-one virtual representation of a property, track where all the talent is in real time, track where all the toys are in real time, and then people can click into various live streams. And once they're watching a live stream hopefully watching their favorite talent, they could actually choose these actions to affect what's really happening there. So it could be as crazy as me swimming in the reef and the users deciding to chum the water. And given the sharks in the area, I think a lot of people want to see, see that happen. Or as simple as buying somebody a drink.”
Steal thisLet a remote audience pay micro-transactions to trigger real-world actions in a live broadcast, turning viewers into participants.
Story
Two-line text to 8 VCs, four said 'we're in' within minutes
Months out of prison, McFarland texted eight venture funds a broken-grammar two-line message; two told him to fuck off, one went silent, one asked questions, and four replied within minutes saying they were in. He can't legally raise because an SEC deal bars him from selling securities.
“I texted like 8 venture funds a few weeks ago and, you know, was literally like a broken grammar, like 2-line sentence. Like 2 told me to fuck off. Like, you know, one didn't respond, you know, one asked for more questions and 4 just like responded in like, you know, within minutes saying we're in. The issue is, you know, as I've kind of gone through the process, I'm actually not allowed due to an SEC deal. I'm not allowed to raise securities.”
Idea
Become the go-to GPT-3 expert consultant for big brands
McFarland's pitch: deeply learn GPT-3 and OpenAI's tech, become the recognized expert, and make a killing consulting and teaching big brands what's happening and what's coming.
“I think if someone wants to go in and really understand, uh, GPT-3, like the, what's kind of powering the OpenAI, and just become an expert on that. I think you can be like, make a killing as a consultant and like teaching all these big brands like what's happening there and like what's gonna happen.”
Steal thisGo deep on a brand-new AI capability before the market catches up and sell yourself as the go-to consultant to large brands.
Idea
Open influencer marketplace: brands post a budget, anyone earns by performance
McFarland's idea for a performance-based influencer marketplace: brands upload creative assets and a budget, anyone can post the content to their own social, and each poster earns a share of the budget proportional to the engagement they drive, removing middlemen and turning followers into advertisers.
“They can go and upload all their creative assets and set like a million dollar budget. And then anybody around the world could take those assets and post it to their Instagram or their TikTok or their YouTube., and then they basically get a score for how much engagement they get in their content, and their overall score gets them a percentage of the budget. So if Kim Kardashian posts it and she crushes it, you know, she gets $900 grand and $100,000 is split up to, you know, another million people who all kind of post it.”
Steal thisBuild a marketplace where brands fund a budget, anyone can post their creative, and payouts are split by measured engagement instead of negotiated rates.
Idea
Open influencer marketplace: brands post a budget, anyone earns by performance
McFarland's idea for a performance-based influencer marketplace: brands upload creative assets and a budget, anyone can post the content to their own social, and each poster earns a share of the budget proportional to the engagement they drive, removing middlemen and turning followers into advertisers.
“They can go and upload all their creative assets and set like a million dollar budget. And then anybody around the world could take those assets and post it to their Instagram or their TikTok or their YouTube., and then they basically get a score for how much engagement they get in their content, and their overall score gets them a percentage of the budget. So if Kim Kardashian posts it and she crushes it, you know, she gets $900 grand and $100,000 is split up to, you know, another million people who all kind of post it.”
Steal thisBuild a marketplace where brands fund a budget, anyone can post their creative, and payouts are split by measured engagement instead of negotiated rates.
Number
$170K in revenue since November 1st, already spent
McFarland's new venture Pirate collected $170,000 in revenue from brand deals since November 1st, a roughly seven-week run, all of which he says was already spent just trying to survive.
$170K
Revenue since November 1st · USD
“$170K since, yeah, November 1st. Yeah.”
Idea
AI sentencing tool to fix wildly unequal prison sentences
Having seen identical crimes draw wildly different sentences depending on a single judge, McFarland pitches an AI system that ingests the crime and the person's life, studies outcomes of similar past cases, and recommends a sentence optimized for future success as a check on the judge.
“Maybe this is a really cool business, is to build some sort of like AI sentencing thing. Because like right now it's up to one independent judge. And that judge, like in my case, I could have gotten nothing or I could have gotten 20 years. And like literally one person can decide the fate of your life.”
Steal thisBuild an AI second opinion that recommends sentences from comparable past cases to reduce single-judge disparity.