What Could Go Wrong: LimeWire Acquires Fyre Festival Brand

A former file-sharing giant is trying to catch a second wave in the music scene. Well, sort of. LimeWire has acquired the Fyre Festival brand.

As per the New York Times, LimeWire is now in the community performance event business. This week, the free peer-to-peer sharing service turned NFT platform announced they have purchased the Fyre Festival. With the purchase, LimeWire acquires all of its trademarks, intellectual property, website domains, and social media channels. The company recognizes the move might not make sense to the public, thus they purposely played into it in a cheeky way. “Fyre became a symbol of hype gone wrong, but it also made history,” said Julian Zehetmayr, CEO of LimeWire. “We’re not bringing the festival back – we’re bringing the brand and the meme back to life. This time with real experiences, and without the cheese sandwiches.”

Senior leadership continued to nod to the festival that never was in their press release. “We’re not here to repeat the mistakes — we’re here to own the meme and do it right. Fyre became a symbol of everything that can go wrong. Now it’s our chance to show what happens when you pair cultural relevance with real execution,” added Marcus Feistl, COO of LimeWire.

After serving time in prison for wire fraud, Billy McFarland, Fyre’s original founder, announced Fyre Festival II in April 2023. It was originally scheduled for May 30, 2025 to June 2, 2025 in Isla Mujeres, Mexico, but local officials denied it was ever approved to go on. In April, Billy McFarland announced he was putting it up for sale after admitting the project became “bigger than what I’m able to lead on my own.”

At this time there are no further details on what we can expect from the reimagined version of Fyre Festival.