We all remember the days when half the fun of a sleepover was piling into a car and forcing your parents to drag you to a local Blockbuster so you could walk down the sexy movie aisle and scandalize yourself pick out a family-friendly film to watch over some butter popcorn. Sadly, Blockbuster went bankrupt because the internet happened and people stopped leaving the house. Now Netflix is the name of the game, and it will be here forever, with parents passing their precious accounts down from generation to generation until the Sun explodes and we all turn to dust….or will it?!? According to a report in the LA Times, despite the fact that Netflix is literally a staple of modern life—it’s not “HBOGO and Chill,” after all—Netflix is apparently in a spot of trouble. And by “a spot of trouble,” I mean “$20 billion in debt.” Fuck. How could this happen? Literally, how the fuck could this happen? I did not go on 50+ Bumble Dates where some bro told me I “have to” watch Stranger Things for Netflix to be $20 billion in debt. I have been paying them $7.99 per/month since before I’d ever tried alcohol. What gives?
**Briefly considers buying own Netflix account**
**chokes on laughter**
Netflix has over 104 million subscribers worldwide, and its content accounts for more than a third of all prime-time download Internet traffic in North America. It has over 50 original shows and has gotten 91 Emmy nominations so like…how the f are you $20.54 billion in debt? Is that how much it cost to get the Fuller House cast together? I’m confused.
Apparently, Netflix is unconcerned, and they have no intention of ending their over-the-top spending anytime soon. Same. I mean, you know what they say, you gotta spend money to make money or whatever. At least, that’s what I tell myself every time I max out another credit card. Haven’t gotten to the “make money” part of that plan yet, but I’m sure it is coming.
Anyway, here’s hoping Netflix gets their shit together because I’d hate to have to start inviting bros over for sex under the pretext of watching something on Hulu. That would be so embarrassing.
Ah, the Fyre Festival. Literally the funniest thing to happen to a large group of social media influencers since, well, the advent of social media. We all know the basic story: a group of wealthy influencers were promised a lavish festival experience on a “luxury” island only to arrive to find they had, in fact, been played. Two days, 12 lawsuits, and 150 hilarious Instagrams later, the man behind the Fyre Festival is facing charges of wire fraud, and I’m not talking about Ja Rule.
Nope, I’m talking about Billy McFarland, the IRL Joanne The Scammer who conned Ja and 85 other investors into thinking he could put on a music festival, when in fact he had approximately 0% of the skills or money needed to do so.
Side bar: Poor Ja Rule. All he wanted to do was re-start his career by putting his name on a luxury music festival without doing any research or ever checking in to see that said festival actually existed before selling tickets and sending hundreds of people to a glorified sandbar in the middle of the Bahamas. Is that really so much to ask?
McFarland, whose previous claim to fame was starting a “social black card” called Magnises where people paid $250 annually for “VIP experiences,” was arrested Friday by federal authorities and charged with wire fraud.
Side bar #2: “Magnises” also fell apart, with members complaining that they were “duped” and that many of the “VIP experiences” were cancelled last minute with very slow refund times. So like…did nobody Google this guy before going into business with him? Seems like this could have been easily avoided.
Also, Magnises looks like Penises and is a very dumb name for a company. Moving on…
McFarland was released Saturday on $300,000 bail, which was either paid for with the tears of a thousand Instagram models, or by his parents, who are wealthy New Jersey real estate developers because of-fucking-course they are.
A central part of McFarland’s bail hearing was to figure out exactly how much money the King Fuckboy has. On the one hand, he is currently making payments on a $110,000 Maserati, rents a $21k/month apartment in Manhattan (WHERE THO??), and had $5k in cash on him when he was arrested.
On the other hand, he has to be represented by a public defender because his previous lawyers quit once he stopped being able to pay them.
That’s right, this rich real estate bro who literally made a living scamming rich people by promising luxury experiences is now using a public defender that would normally be reserved for actual poor people who can’t afford lawyers. If only The O.C. were real. Sandy Cohen would never stand for this.
The crux of the case against McFarland (because you sadly can’t charge someone with “obvious fuckery”) is that he lied and defrauded investors in Fyre Media by overstating the company’s income. Prior to the Fyre Festival, Fyre Media’s entire company was a single website that “allowed people to book celebrities for parties and events.” So you know how every once in a while your local club would have Snooki come DJ or some shit? That’s Fyre Media.
Again, did no one look into this man before giving him millions of dollars? Do rich people not know about Google? I’m so confused.
In a criminal complaint unsealed on Friday, the government alleges that McFarland operated a scheme to “defraud investors by drastically overstating the wealth of Fyre Media.” Which, once more for the people in the back, was literally just a website.
The complain also alleges that in one instance, McFarland altered an account statement to say that he owned $2.5 million in a particular company’s stocks, when in fact he only owned around $1,500. Homie isn’t even smooth. All he had to do was lie a little less and say it was $1.5 million and then be like “Omg! Typo! Autocorrect is so crazy…” But I think it’s pretty clear at this point that Billy isn’t really the “thinking ahead” type.
Billy is out on bail now, chilling in NJ with his parents until his preliminary hearing, which was scheduled for July 31st of this year. If convicted, he could face up to 20 years in prison, but he’s also a rich white guy in America so he could end up coming out of this with a cake and negative prison time. We’ll just have to wait and see.
So yeah, you’re gonna want to pre-order a shitload of popcorn because this trial is going to be about as lit as Fyre Festival was supposed to be.
United Airlines, aka the the Fyre Festival of airlines (or is Fyre Festival the United Airlines of festivals? Unclear.) is in trouble yet again for its policy of bumping paying customers off of flights that they purposely overbooked. Last time, it was a doctor on his way home to treat his patients. This time, it was a 27-month-old toddler who was forced to sit in his mother’s lap for the entirety of their three-hour flight due to a “mix-up in the United Airlines system.”
Note To Anyone From United Who Might Be Reading This: When given the choice between bumping an actual baby and bumping a human adult, bump the adult every time. People get like, really sensitive about how you treat babies. Also, get back to work. Your business is literally a dumpster fire of awful.
Shirley Yamauchi, the mom in this situation, told NBC News that she spent almost $1k each on tickets for herself and her son to get from Hawaii to Boston. After a five-hour layover in Houston (Sidebar: $1k each of non-direct flights on a disgraced airline?!? Somebody needs to tell this woman about Kayak ASAP…) Yamauchi and her son Taizo were forced to share a seat so some bro in standby could take it.
According to Yamauchi, none of the flight attendants said shit about the fact that she was just expected to carry a 25 pound human on her lap for the entirety of the flight which, considering that Yamauchi is only 5’2,” is a lot of baby for one person to handle.
Yamauchi said that she did not speak up right away due to “recent problems with United Aircrafts,” aka the time they broke a doctor’s face for refusing to give up his seat. Not really something you want to get into with a baby on your lap.
This entire incident comes just a few short months after United CEO and Person-Who-Should-Probably-Just-Give-Up-And-Move-To-The-Woods Oscar Munoz sent a public letter stating the company was going to “do better.” In his defense, while United did bump a baby out of his seat, they didn’t physically assault the baby, which is, technically, better.
Note #2 To Anyone from United Who Might Be Reading This: Maybe do a quick check to say “hey, are all babies seated comfortably and safely?” before shooting a giant metal bird into the sky. Just a thought.
On the bright side, Yamauchi did manage to get a refund for her son’s seat, in the form of a United Airlines voucher, so she’ll get to relive her amazing United Airlines experience all over again free of charge. Amazing.
United spokesman and Only-Person-With-A-Worse-Job-Than-Sean-Spicer Jonathan Guerin said in a statement:
“On a recent flight from Houston to Boston, we inaccurately scanned the boarding pass of Ms. Yamauchi’s son. As a result, her son’s seat appeared to be not checked in, and staff released his seat to another customer and Ms. Yamauchi held her son for the flight. We deeply apologize to Ms. Yamauchi and her son for this experience.”
Yamauchi, on the other hand, is about as satisfied with that explanation as you are with your fuckboy’s explanation for not answering your texts: “I saw them zap both tickets. There was no issue, no problem. They let us through. It just doesn’t add up. It’s very weird.”
She also is not satisfied with the whole “voucher” thing, saying “It doesn’t seem right or enough for pain and discomfort.”
Atta girl, Shirley. Get your damn money. As Ivana Trump famously said in First Wives Club:
