After Jan Böhmermann uncovered Fynn Kliemann’s dubious mask business in “ZDF Magazin Royale”, among other things, the career of the 34-year-old musician, YouTuber, media designer and businessman got into trouble. A video published on Sunday (June 19) in which Fynn Kliemann presents himself in a hysterical voice as the victim of an intrigue and the “woken left scene” should not have helped him. And also that, according to the ARD research that has now been published, he at least grossly botched – if not cheated – at the auction of digital works of art should pour additional fuel into the fire.
Discrepancies at NFT auction
Specifically, it is about an auction of so-called non-fungible tokens (NFT) in March 2021. The idea of the NFTs is that a specific physical or digital object is represented by a unique, non-divisible blockchain and can be traded in this way. Fynn Kliemann seemed enthusiastic about this idea in spring 2021 and auctioned 99 short pieces of music as NFTs for a total of around 215,000 euros. As a Research by the political magazine “Contrasts” now uncoveredthere were major discrepancies.
The auction was supposed to end at 8 p.m. on March 7, 2021 – according to the auction conditions drawn up by Kliemann. At this time, the current highest bidder should have won the bid. In reality, however, Kliemann only ended the auctions later in many cases, so that bidding on the NFTs could continue in the meantime. In the end, the bid was not won by the person who had submitted the highest bid at the scheduled end of the auction, but by the person who bid the most at the random time when Kliemann ended the auction. According to calculations by “Contrasts”, Fynn Kliemann is said to have increased his sales at the auction by an additional 68,000 euros in this way.
Fynn Kliemann: “I’m sorry”
Shortly after the auction, Kliemann replied to the e-mail of a bidder who had submitted the highest bid for an NFT at the official end of the auction at 8 p.m., but had still not received it, as follows: “I’m really sorry. You are absolutely right.” In a blog post at the time, Kliemann also indicated that not everything had gone smoothly at the auction.
Fynn Kliemann’s lawyer replied to the request from “Contrasts” that Kliemann had entered new territory with the auction and that unexpected problems had arisen. Kliemann would have believed that he could have ended all the auctions at once at 8 p.m., although he actually had to end each auction manually.
Those bidders who held the highest bid at the end of the auction but did not receive the NFT are now entitled to the NFT or compensation. However, they would have to take legal action against the YouTuber themselves. His lawyers should already be working at full capacity – the Stade public prosecutor’s office recently initiated proceedings against Kliemann.