Billy McFarland, a year out of prison, says Fyre Festival II is 'finally happening'

• Billy McFarland, the creator of the failed Fyre Festival, teased a possible resurgence of the event.
• In a tweet Sunday, McFarland asked Twitter users why they should be invited to "Fyre Festival II."

Billy McFarland, the creator behind the failed Fyre Festival, is floating the idea of a possible follow-up.

"Fyre Festival II is finally happening," McFarland tweeted on Sunday.

He also asked Twitter users to let him know why they deserved an invite.

McFarland hasn't revealed any further details about a potential follow-up to Fyre Festival — and he didn't immediately respond to a request for additional comment ahead of publication.

But he has been active in the replies to his tweet about the follow-up festival. McFarland messaged Chris Bakke, a tech cofounder who tweeted a screenshot appearing to show the Fyre Festival creator inviting him to "Fyre Fest II." Bakke didn't immediately respond to a request for comment on whether McFarland had discussed any further details over text.

"Going to crush the island version first, but @ElonMusk Fyre 3 definitely needs to be in space," McFarland replied on Twitter.

McFarland has been out of prison for a year now

Last March, McFarland was released early from his six-year prison sentence, following his guilty plea to charges of wire fraud and a forfeiture order of $26 million after being accused of defrauding more than 100 investors in the 2017 Fyre Festival.

Back in 2017, McFarland sold over 5,000 tickets to what he claimed would be a two-weekend luxury music festival on a private beach on the island of Great Exuma in the Bahamas. Along with Ja Rule, a rapper and Fyre Festival cofounder, McFarland, recruited influencers — including Kendall Jenner, Emily Ratajkowski, and Hailey Bieber — to promote the event.

Ja Rule, whose real name is Jeffrey Atkins, said he was scammed and was later dismissed from a $100-million class action lawsuit brought by attendees, according to The Guardian.

According to the BBC, tickets for the festival were on sale for up to $75,000, which were said to include luxury accommodations like eco-friendly "domes and villas."

The reality proved disastrous. The failed music festival left hundreds of attendees stranded at the venue in the Bahamas without adequate food, water, shelter, or even the musical acts that had been promised as big names like Blink-182, Pusha T, and Lil Yachty had backed out days prior to the event's start.

Photos and videos of the infamous event made the rounds on social media throughout the weekend. Stranded attendees posted photos of the disappointing meals, accommodations, and a lack of organization.

Since then, the aftermath of the event has spawned two documentaries from Netflix and Hulu, the latter of which McFarland participated in.

As detailed in Netflix's 2019 documentary, "Fyre," Bahamian locals who constructed the festival and helped cater the food said they were never compensated for their work. After the documentary was released, GoFundMe pages raised hundreds of thousands of dollars for the caterers and laborers.

While McFarland agreed, as part of his plea deal, to never serve as the director of a public company again, he has spoken about his ambitions to work in the tech industry.

Shortly after his release from serving four years in prison, McFarland announced his next startup, PYRT, on the "Full Send Podcast" last November. He told the podcast hosts that PYRT would include a hotel, events, "treasure hunts," and merch.

The tweet isn't the first time McFarland has spoken about organizing another festival. On the podcast from November, McFarland also mentioned a possible PYRT fest.

"So I have to do a PYRT fest, right? It can't be tomorrow, it can't be in four months, but there's going to be PYRT fest," McFarland told the podcast hosts.