I have attended festivals for more than half of my life and they're all suspectable to the same gentrification problem as cool neighborhoods: fun/artsy people create fun environments, fun environments attract others who genuinely appreciate fun/artsy but are professionals themselves, professionals attract other professionals but shallower with more money. Or, in short, they get hugged to death. Rinse, repeat.
Same thing is happening with Garbicz festival in Poland, arguably Europe's Burning Man equivalent for many.
I always considered Garbicz a very commercial festival even from the very beginning. The ticket was expensive, food was included, all infrastructure already built and you party and leave without much thought at all. The people also had little regard for the beautiful nature and lake - A pretty typical techno festival catering for the Berlin clubscene.
Burns usually are completely different. Yeah Burning Man is super commercial now, but smaller more obscure burns happen all over the world, including Europe. They run on participant preparation and donation, these still embody what Burning Man was originally about
That's fair. Most recently, though, Garbicz started inviting bona-fide Instagram influencers, which I know first hand from people who worked with them as their personal butters of sorts. So maybe it was a long game all along, considering those festivals can nowadays sell for tens of millions...
> fun/artsy people create fun environments, fun environments attract others who genuinely appreciate fun/artsy but are professionals themselves, professionals attract other professionals but shallower with more money.
This. The tourist:creator ratio increases until the organization begins to cater to tourists.
The two things Burning Man should have built into its culture were (1) if you don't create personally then you're not welcome (ostensibly, but normalized flying into catered theme camps is so far past the gross line...) & (2) continual mutation (fuck the Principles; burns should each be updating their own every year).
SF got rich and then succumbed to the same human faults they used to mock.
There was a sentence early on in the article, “San Francisco has always been a place people came to re-create themselves — running from something, running toward something exciting and unknown, going as far as they could for a shot at a new life.” although I think the tense there should probably be more “used to be” than “has always been” thanks to the same gentrification influence. I feel like much of California has had the same thing happen to it. When I first went to Los Angeles in 1986, it seemed a magical place with so much potential, but the expense and population growth over the last 40 years makes it nearly unrecognizable compared to the place I lived in then (I moved back to Chicago 15 years ago so it’s in the past).
When you read about people coming to California in the 60s and 70s (and somewhat in the 80s), it had that same magical quality that Burning Man had in the early years and has suffered the same kinds of changes. I wonder what the 2026 equivalent of going to California is now, if such a thing even exists or can exist.
> I wonder what the 2026 equivalent of going to California is now, if such a thing even exists or can exist.
I think this becomes increasingly difficult, because the timelines become so short with almost-instant information desimination, higher inequality and increased mobility for everyone. A place or event can go from underground -> awesome -> gentrified -> 'dead' in a manner of a couple of years now.
I live in a neighborhood that is currently being gentrified; 10 years ago no non-local wanted to live here, 5 years ago, it was the place to be, today young/hip people are beginning to move elsewhere again. Newly rented-out flats are now thrice as expensive as 2020, and you can see in real time how bars and restaurants are replaced with more expensive alternatives. When I compare this with other neighborhoods in Berlin (eg. Bergmannkiez or Kollwitzkiez), the timeline has roughly halfed.
Dalton Caldwell and Michael Seibel have talked about a similar phenomenon applied to YC and startups in general. It seems that early on it was a weird and nonconformist career move, but now it has become something that is done out of the same conforming impulse that going to school or working at a big firm mean to an individual in society.
> When you read about people coming to California in the 60s and 70s (and somewhat in the 80s), it had that same magical quality that Burning Man had in the early years and has suffered the same kinds of changes. I wonder what the 2026 equivalent of going to California is now, if such a thing even exists or can exist.
I look at LA and I look at cities in China and it makes LA look like a rural suburb the difference in population density is so vast.
I wonder if the original organizers would have much say left if something becomes big enough and successful. It requires a very strong mindset to close something down. Makes me think about the batman movie debacle on some wanting to destroy Gotham city cause they think its beyond repair and then some other ones are hopeful to save it.
Problem is, the more of them I've seen, the more I am convinced they are nowadays a premeditated long game: have cool people plant the seed, then sell it 10 years later. Same thing with LGBTQ communities attracted/coerced into certain neighborhoods.
Not for the festivals that I know. They are either always profit-oriented or always not. There are or were (RIP Melt Festival) great ones of both types.
An aside though about the whole "lost its soul". I was looking up Marion Goodell's salary and it's pretty high. The Burning Man ORG spends a lot on salaries, especially since it relies on a mostly volunteer workforce.
She and the C-suite for the Burning Man Org make like $300,000 plus. It's not a HUGE amount in San Francisco if you consider tech salaries but I parsed salaries of CEOs of arts organizations in California and she's still easily by far the most highly paid CEO in her field.
That's a huge amount even in San Francisco. Sometimes I'm shocked what working in big tech does to people's ideas about what a normal annual salary is.
Burning Man is a once a year event. Being a c level for that is not comparable to being c level for a lot of other even non profit orgs not to even mention for profit orgs
I think you can argue, as the author does, whether the nature of the event has changed but Burning man attracts about 80k people at this point. That's comparable to Wacken, the largest annual metal festival in the world. I know people involved in that one and it's definitely a year long job to organize.
300k is a lot of money but for someone overseeing an event that size, doesn't seem that extraordinary. In particular given the responsibility for the safety of people.
I mean she is the CEO title, but even then she's still making more than MOST of the non-profits getting city contracts in SF. She makes 400k. The revenue for Burning Man is about 40 million you can compare here too.
Ex: Healthright 360 has 1600 employees and makes $145 million in revenue and it's CEO is still paid less than her. They provide healthcare and other types of care for people without insurance.
300k would put you in the top 5% of households and 3-4x the median household, let alone single earners. You are absolutely beyond “comfortably middle class” with that salary.
Nawh, not even. The truth is it takes 550k/yr TC to buy a basic house ($1.6M) in exactly the neighborhood where I grew up in scrubby yards and broken sidewalks south San José. In SF, it takes 720k TC to afford a regular house ($2.5M). Boomer and Greatest generations got Prop 13 extra low property taxes (like $1064/y because it's 1.4% on $76k valuation) and then everyone else pays 1.4%/y (14k) on a million+ house at market value.
About 15 years ago it really started to get corporate. Big money came in and created camps with air conditioning, huge RV's no bartering, etc.
Dustin Moskovitz and the like started going and wouldn't dare behave the ordinary peasants, by sleeping in tents, participating in the community, bartering for things.
Heck Zuckerberg took a helicopter there one year.
instead they just threw money at the event so they wouldn't have to do the things that made burning man, burning man.
Worth reading Dustin's personal account of his Burning Man experience: https://medium.com/i-m-h-o/radical-inclusion-vs-radical-self... (bear in mind this was written 13 years ago, I'm not sure Dustin would agree with everything stated, but the broad strokes feel correct.)
That post also explains Zuck's attendance. Zuck is not a Burner, it was a one-off visit encouraged by Dustin. Personally I think it was inconsequential in the long run but good for Zuck to have seen it.
The criticism you're raising about money being thrown at the event is broadly valid, but it does not at all apply to how Dustin approached it, IMO. Dustin did precisely what you are suggesting he didn't - slept in a tent, literally cooked and served grilled cheese sandwiches.
(Context: I was in the camp/village, attended 10 years 2009-2018, back once in 2025, have done a lot of playa art... and I also broadly agree with John Law's take.)
I work at a financial company and around 2019, the break room had a magazine called “Meetings” with a front-page article about how burning man and sxsw are the next big thing in corporate culture.
What are you talking 'corporate' - there are no corporate sponsors, and people having been coming in with their big camp A/C rvs for 25 years at least.
There's an airport there for 30 years - people have been flying airplanes and helicoptors forever.
> Heck Zuckerberg took a helicopter there one year.
The vast majority of the people I knew who flew in weren’t rich like Zuck, they just liked flying. It’s the only way to get a wristband that allows you to come and go at will (i.e. to run logistics for a camp) and avoid exodus if you had to leave that day.
15 years ago no one gave a damn about the rich people going to burning man. They were isolated in their camps. We were much more concerned with keeping our Sparkle Ponies alive.
And funny enough, John Law himself has basically been saying the same thing since the late '90s. He's been shaking his fist at this particular cloud for over twenty-five years, so I'm not sure why an opinion piece like this is even noteworthy at this point.
FWIW, for a lot of us, the magic is still there. Most of the city exists outside of the shiny Instagram influencers that seem to dominate the narrative. We're still there being gross and building shit for the joy of it with our friends.
> ...the festival I helped invent 36 years ago. Curiously, I get this interest even though I haven’t set foot in the Black Rock Desert since 1996.
Not doubting the headline conclusion, but I would have expected a better source than someone who hasn't been to Burning Man in literally 30 years. AFAICT, Burning Man was still very well regarded ~20 years ago, long after this founder stopped attending
He also neglected to mention that Larry Harvey attended up through his death, afaik. Or how deeply affected the city was the year Larry died.
Or that the man design was done for so long by a close collaborator of Larry’s. And that the man base has been frequently spectacular both on fire and not.
The historical perspective and old photos are great but I’m not much for the conclusion. I would be willing to bet the title and byline are editorialized by the publisher.
You can still go out there with not much, be new and participate and just smile at some famous or not person also on their way back from the Portos.
There is a lot of money involved, no doubt and there is a lot of bullshit too, like art cars that do fundraisers and take volunteer contributions only to remain largely private vessels for a particular crew, a few celebs etc.
And there’s a lot to not like about the org or how art grants are handled, it’s a big system it has the exploits and nepotism that might infect anything scaled and offering power.
But if you go and do not look closely and just give in small ways none of that would likely be visible to you.
You could have the time of your life. Or not. Which I think suggests the opportunity for adventure and chaos still remains at that thing in the desert.
it’s still the city. the org might be run in a lame way but any time you get too involved in something you see another layer of politics and favoritism and helping friends out that just seems wrong. most people going aren’t at that level and it’s fine. you’ll still have a good time (if you want to)
I think the point GP was making was that the co-founder was basing their judgment secondhand from stories from friends and headlines.
Another bit I found peculiar was the mentions of anarchism while seeming to have a rigid idea of what the event should or should not be. It's certainly far less anarchistic today—placements, permits, law enforcement—but it's not exactly anarchism to say it isn't allowed to evolve to fit the scale and culture of the participants.
Every anarchistic community ends up with rules to ensure things run smoothly. I think anarchism should be viewed as the movement towards less rules, not a movement that allows absolutely no rules. Allocating office desks so that everyone knows where their desk is is just common sense - if you're concerned about people envying the best desks, randomise it every week. You have to mark out roads if you want there to be roads.
Law enforcement was probably there because law enforcement said they'd ban the whole event if law enforcement wasn't there. That's how they typically work.
anarchism is no rulers, not no rules. "it always ends up..." please, i would love to hear all these examples you have. burning man isn't anarchism, btw. anarchism rejects all hierarchies, is typically horizontally organized, often ran by consensus though decision making varies by flavor, is inherently anticapitalist. there would be no profit and remuneration would be even across the board. you can see how burning man could never be called anarchist. but some examples for your consideration, ezln doesn't claim it but the way they organize themselves it's largely the same, rojava, cnt-fai/revolutionary spain.
everyone always insinuates the extreme, see currently the right and left trying to burn down the scary socialists.
Does america need more socialism to to help break the back of this oligarchic fascist state fuck yes. Do I want to live in pure socialism, no, no I do not. I will however hold positions further left than I think we are able to achieve simply to help move the overton window back to some fucking sanity.
We stake out these purely moral positions at the extreme poles because we want to move the concept of where the center actually is, we know we cannot achieve some kind of communist/socialist utopia, but you don't win by negotiating with yourself before you are at the table with the adversary.
san francisco had that cool, edgy, gonzo art scene happening in the 90s. also survival research laboratories and their famous pitching machine, the omnicircus, chicken john, laughing squid, critical mass/commute clot, santarchy/santa con (before it became the weird frat thing it is today). similar things in brooklyn in the '00s like the madagascar institute, black label bike club, idiotarod, etc.
in the 2000s, there was kind of an interesting tech meets countercultural art thing where a lot of the more interesting tech people would pour their disposable income into interesting burning man art projects (nimby's ddi, jabba's sail barge) but it does seem like in recent years with the real sf affordability crisis that came with internet business actually taking off the creativity went down and the money seeking people showed up. i guess that's also true of sf (and brooklyn) more generally.
it was a fun time. i was a swe intern in the mid 90s and would marvel when the engineering team would disappear to the desert for a week and come back with colored hair. my boss drove a psychedelic school bus to work sometimes. in south of market on 6th street in sf, there was a building that had furniture welded onto the exterior like it had all come to life and was trying to escape the building.
I started going in 2002 and have friends who have gone every year since then.
There has been a meme that burning man sucks now and used to be better that entire time.
That doesn't mean the meme is false. It definitely has changed. There's an article in sfgate today that quotes the head of the Death Guild (Thunderdome) camp as saying something like, do people want to carry on the traditions their parents had, or invent their own?
I thought that was a great question. Both are valid paths.
I don’t know anything about burning man except the actor who originally played Dr. Weir on Stargate SG1 was fired (essentially) because she misled the producers about attending it. Tory Higgens did a fine job as her replacement though.
From the narrative on Wikipedia, it looks more like she was fired not because she hid the truth, but because she was indeed attending Burning Man and the producers didn't like the idea: "committed to naked drugging in the desert" as opposed to misleading anyone. If she'd told the truth, it'd probably have the same result.
I've known this for awhile, since at least 2020. Specifically when they told a documentarian he could film and then threatened litigation he release his film after he had already shot it. He had to blur literally everything at Burning Man but the guy he's following around.
I've known this for awhile, since at least 2020. Specifically when they told a documentarian he could film and then threatened litigation if he released his film — after he had already shot it. He had to painstakingly blur literally all Burning Man footage except for the guy he's following around.
I don't understand how nostalgia can be applied to Burning Man.
Outside of those few who dedicate themselves to the organization and administration of the event, each burning man is a unique assemblage of thousands of people, different in every way from one year to the next. Except perhaps the location.
Without the different human beings who show up each year, the event would be nothing more than a dust bowl waiting to become a mud pit.
The "soul," if there is one, is the sum total of the expressions those humans bring with them at any given point in time.
Change the humans and you change the expression. So exactly which "soul" does the author long for?
As the author says himself, he hasn’t attended in 30 years. I understand some of the things he’s complaining about, but I don’t think that is the dominant experience of being there.
Blackrock used to be pretty wild-west (I was going before Burning Man started), pretty scary stuff at times (a friend once did something silly and hurt himself badly, Clinton was doing something in Reno, the SS heard about it, thought it was nearby and MiB showed up looking hot and bothered in their suits), over time the BLM realised that they needed to police the area a bit more and things got toned down (doesn't help that BM situates itself across multiple law enforcement jurisdictions, these days there's a surfeit of police)
If he has not been there since 1996 then I don't think he has a right to be talking about it like this, honestly, it's kind of sad trash talk.
Maybe he's right but he'd have to articulate it. It's a relatively authentic and vibrant thing. Maybe not as new or quite as punk, but it's 'something'.
I mean, if they relinquish their ownership of the plane and joined in with some sort of council that determined how to manage such assets I bet everyone claiming to be an anarchist would be fine with it. Anarchy as a political ideology doesn't mean no rules, it means no rulers.
But come on. The world kinda sucks. If a bunch of people want to go to the desert with no cell phone service and just do their thing, why do we care? If some of them need an RV to do it, and they aren't charging others, so what? That's awesome, and life would be better if more people had the ability to do their own flavors of Burning Man.
> ...and life would be better if more people had the ability to do their own flavors of Burning Man.
I'm biased and a bit amusingly jaded because I left the US many years ago and have been living overseas for a long time, so take my next paragraph with that context.
Have you been to a Mexican ranchero wedding that lasts several days? Enjoyed a weekend BBQ in a Filipino province? Been invited by a bunch of 60 and 70-somethings in a small town in Vietnam who don't speak English to sing karaoke with them?
Enjoying life doesn't have to be a monumental, once-a-year event, and it shouldn't be.
You can't just post an article about pollution and use that as a trump card.
The pollution that comes from the Burning Man artwork, which is the crux of that article, is less than one plane from JFK to SFO. If we're going to complain about anything, the flights to Burning Man dwarf the actual event. But even then, the week of Burning Man, only 0.03% of travel will be people going to BM.
I get it, 70,000 people in one spot creates trash and pollution. But we all are, every minute of every day. In the grand scheme of things, Burning Man is _not_ the problem.
Why can't everyone just do what they want without us taking it to the extremes? I agree meeting locals is a ton of fun and should be a part of everyone's life. But if a bunch of people want to go to a desert and hang out for a week, and they clean up after themselves, why do you care?
> The pollution that comes from the Burning Man artwork, which is the crux of that article...
Did you even read the article? It stated very clearly:
> With organizers themselves estimating that Burning Man emits 100,000 tons of carbon every year, it is clear things cannot stay the same on the playa.
100,000 tons total. Please don't cherry-pick one part of the article to make a point.
> ...and they clean up after themselves...
Except, if you actually did the research, you would know that there are lots of reports of trash being dumped in nearby towns, including Reno and Tahoe. It's not the straightforward "they clean up after themselves" you make it out to be.
> Why can't everyone just do what they want without us taking it to the extremes?
Who took anything to an extreme? Most of my comment was pointing out that in much of the world, particularly in places where people have way less, they find a way to enjoy life and have fun without events that have the environmental impact of a Burning Man.
I'm not calling for Burning Man to be banned. But what I think is extreme is the idea that, because the "world kinda sucks", the solution is for people to take a few days out of the year to go into the desert and let loose. Have a monthly BBQ with friends. Sing karaoke on the weekend. Take a hike every Sunday. Those things will contribute way more to a durable enjoyment of life than a Burning Man.
I looked a bit into the author. His friend unfortunately died at Burning Man in 1996, as did two other people. Since then, he left and has been an advocate for shutting down Burning Man. They fought over the name for 10 years after that.
They can be, but unfortunately the org has threatened to revoke official regional burn status unless they followed all the same rules, in particular, that children be allowed. There used to be some leeway on that, and there were really wonderful regional burns that did not permit kids. They were forced to, which resulted in the "real" burn being in a small taped off area.
Seems insane to me to think kids should be at burns.
I usually camp where I can get some distance from the noise, which means I hang out with the burner parents and their kids. It's really great to see all of the ways that burners adapt their art so that kids can participate, and the kids bring a pretty excellent energy also.
Most recently I was navigating this wooden maze, lots of tight spaces and odd bends necessary to get through it. Part way through I encountered a bunch of kids who weren't tall enough to get over a ledge (they navigated the rest of the thing with ease). I made myself into stairs for them and they completed it. Later I had an epic foam sword fight with the same bunch. It was super fun.
I've never been to the big burn, so maybe I'm just missing out on the magic of whatever you mean by the "real" burn (although many of the people at my regional say it isn't worth it), but I don't think anything was lost by having the kids around.
Their parents are convinced that it's raising a child in default society that's the more dangerous thing, and after talking with several of them I'm convinced as well.
I’m pretty extreme ideologically, and that carries over to parenting. I would consider taking my child and requiring that it be allowed strikes me as an enormous red flag.
> That’s because it’s easier to recruit kids into cults or whatever
That's what Sunday School is for.
I lived in SF at the time of the original burns on Baker Beach and heard about them but I was too lame and isolated to ever participate but followed their antics (and the Cacophony Society) from afar.
The universe arranged for me to go ten years ago and I found the experience magical. There's an exhibit that shows how each wave of newcomers has destroyed burning man which I found to be a cheeky take on its evolution.
The kids I saw there were doing kid friendly stuff and them being allowed there was clearly to allow their parents to come without having to leave them behind.
There's plenty to hate about it but in the end it's about people coming together to have a good time, and there's nothing wrong with that.
Honestly, a pretty incredible article. Yeah, this is what happens. And even so, as he said himself, the newbies continue to find themselves and the proles continue to gather to connect and reconnect.
I imagine many here feel convicted because they see themselves in Law’s descriptions of the well-heeled elite, and they resent Law for saying they are not transgressive instigators, anarchic fire starters, and autonomous free zone inhabitants.
Y’all. Be comfortable with who you are. Most of us just want good money, an awesome time with cool computer shit to do, and friends and family who love us. It’s okay not to be a revolutionary. What’s not okay is to trick yourself into believing you are one when it couldn’t be further from the truth.
Here’s to the revolutionaries - I get to live a more grounded life because of their willingness to live outside the lines.
As someone who is just now learning about burning man, it reminded me a lot of Fight Club (1999). And it turns out the author belonged to some of the clubs behind it, namely Cacophony Society/Suicide Club.
There seems to be a bunch of rules to the event, like the explicit 10 rules of chaos mentioned in the article, but also more implicit rules like "a wooden man must burn".
Fwiw, in the book/movie, the drift of the original spirit of the movement is a central theme, as is the loss of personal control over the evolving movement.
Festivals are big business now. Boomers and Gen Xers have money to spend and spend they do trying to recapture their youth. Hundreds of dollars for passes. Hundreds more spent on food and drink. Times tens or hundreds of thousands of attendees.
Nothing can maintain its essence over time, things change and morph. If you want something scrappy you’re going to have to start over with something new until it too eventually ends up the same way.
>A community effort to construct a 300-mile wall in one week and prevent Burning Man attendees from returning to the Bay Area.
>"I'm asking for your help crowdfunding the most ambitious Burning Man project ever a wall that's built around the entire bay area during the week of Burning Man."
I rather hop a freight train than celebrate pseudo-non-consumerism consumerism with mostly techbros, yuppies, and addictive substance excessivists. Sure there are still some cool burners but it's just way too big. It's a simulacrum of its former self trying to recapture lightning in a bottle like a "blockbuster" bad trilogy franchise built around a good, scrappy film. Better to go my own way.
I have attended festivals for more than half of my life and they're all suspectable to the same gentrification problem as cool neighborhoods: fun/artsy people create fun environments, fun environments attract others who genuinely appreciate fun/artsy but are professionals themselves, professionals attract other professionals but shallower with more money. Or, in short, they get hugged to death. Rinse, repeat.
Same thing is happening with Garbicz festival in Poland, arguably Europe's Burning Man equivalent for many.
I always considered Garbicz a very commercial festival even from the very beginning. The ticket was expensive, food was included, all infrastructure already built and you party and leave without much thought at all. The people also had little regard for the beautiful nature and lake - A pretty typical techno festival catering for the Berlin clubscene.
Burns usually are completely different. Yeah Burning Man is super commercial now, but smaller more obscure burns happen all over the world, including Europe. They run on participant preparation and donation, these still embody what Burning Man was originally about
That's fair. Most recently, though, Garbicz started inviting bona-fide Instagram influencers, which I know first hand from people who worked with them as their personal butters of sorts. So maybe it was a long game all along, considering those festivals can nowadays sell for tens of millions...
> fun/artsy people create fun environments, fun environments attract others who genuinely appreciate fun/artsy but are professionals themselves, professionals attract other professionals but shallower with more money.
This. The tourist:creator ratio increases until the organization begins to cater to tourists.
The two things Burning Man should have built into its culture were (1) if you don't create personally then you're not welcome (ostensibly, but normalized flying into catered theme camps is so far past the gross line...) & (2) continual mutation (fuck the Principles; burns should each be updating their own every year).
SF got rich and then succumbed to the same human faults they used to mock.
There was a sentence early on in the article, “San Francisco has always been a place people came to re-create themselves — running from something, running toward something exciting and unknown, going as far as they could for a shot at a new life.” although I think the tense there should probably be more “used to be” than “has always been” thanks to the same gentrification influence. I feel like much of California has had the same thing happen to it. When I first went to Los Angeles in 1986, it seemed a magical place with so much potential, but the expense and population growth over the last 40 years makes it nearly unrecognizable compared to the place I lived in then (I moved back to Chicago 15 years ago so it’s in the past).
When you read about people coming to California in the 60s and 70s (and somewhat in the 80s), it had that same magical quality that Burning Man had in the early years and has suffered the same kinds of changes. I wonder what the 2026 equivalent of going to California is now, if such a thing even exists or can exist.
> I wonder what the 2026 equivalent of going to California is now, if such a thing even exists or can exist.
I think this becomes increasingly difficult, because the timelines become so short with almost-instant information desimination, higher inequality and increased mobility for everyone. A place or event can go from underground -> awesome -> gentrified -> 'dead' in a manner of a couple of years now.
I live in a neighborhood that is currently being gentrified; 10 years ago no non-local wanted to live here, 5 years ago, it was the place to be, today young/hip people are beginning to move elsewhere again. Newly rented-out flats are now thrice as expensive as 2020, and you can see in real time how bars and restaurants are replaced with more expensive alternatives. When I compare this with other neighborhoods in Berlin (eg. Bergmannkiez or Kollwitzkiez), the timeline has roughly halfed.
That emdash followed by a list sets off my llm detector.
Dalton Caldwell and Michael Seibel have talked about a similar phenomenon applied to YC and startups in general. It seems that early on it was a weird and nonconformist career move, but now it has become something that is done out of the same conforming impulse that going to school or working at a big firm mean to an individual in society.
Before when you had a startup it was because you had a passion and an idea.
Now the passion is the idea of the startup and a big exit.
Totally different groups of people.
> When you read about people coming to California in the 60s and 70s (and somewhat in the 80s), it had that same magical quality that Burning Man had in the early years and has suffered the same kinds of changes. I wonder what the 2026 equivalent of going to California is now, if such a thing even exists or can exist.
I look at LA and I look at cities in China and it makes LA look like a rural suburb the difference in population density is so vast.
Yep. These sorts of evens are better when they have a predetermined end date. Closing down sale, never to be repeated.
Then the organisers can regroup and start something new.
Rather than the inevitable alternative of morphing in to something unintended, undesired.
Better to reminisce about good old days rather than the decay.
I wonder if the original organizers would have much say left if something becomes big enough and successful. It requires a very strong mindset to close something down. Makes me think about the batman movie debacle on some wanting to destroy Gotham city cause they think its beyond repair and then some other ones are hopeful to save it.
> unintended, undesired
Problem is, the more of them I've seen, the more I am convinced they are nowadays a premeditated long game: have cool people plant the seed, then sell it 10 years later. Same thing with LGBTQ communities attracted/coerced into certain neighborhoods.
Not for the festivals that I know. They are either always profit-oriented or always not. There are or were (RIP Melt Festival) great ones of both types.
An aside though about the whole "lost its soul". I was looking up Marion Goodell's salary and it's pretty high. The Burning Man ORG spends a lot on salaries, especially since it relies on a mostly volunteer workforce.
She and the C-suite for the Burning Man Org make like $300,000 plus. It's not a HUGE amount in San Francisco if you consider tech salaries but I parsed salaries of CEOs of arts organizations in California and she's still easily by far the most highly paid CEO in her field.
They also have a CTO what makes 300k.
https://burningman.org/about-us/what-we-do/financials-public...
That's a huge amount even in San Francisco. Sometimes I'm shocked what working in big tech does to people's ideas about what a normal annual salary is.
Burning Man is a once a year event. Being a c level for that is not comparable to being c level for a lot of other even non profit orgs not to even mention for profit orgs
No opinion on the salary, but just because it's a once per year event doesn't mean the work isn't year round.
I think you can argue, as the author does, whether the nature of the event has changed but Burning man attracts about 80k people at this point. That's comparable to Wacken, the largest annual metal festival in the world. I know people involved in that one and it's definitely a year long job to organize.
300k is a lot of money but for someone overseeing an event that size, doesn't seem that extraordinary. In particular given the responsibility for the safety of people.
I mean she is the CEO title, but even then she's still making more than MOST of the non-profits getting city contracts in SF. She makes 400k. The revenue for Burning Man is about 40 million you can compare here too.
https://www.sfchronicle.com/bayarea/article/nonprofit-ceo-co...
Ex: Healthright 360 has 1600 employees and makes $145 million in revenue and it's CEO is still paid less than her. They provide healthcare and other types of care for people without insurance.
300k is a huge amount of money if you have no dependents. Otherwise it's comfortably middle class, but that's it.
300k would put you in the top 5% of households and 3-4x the median household, let alone single earners. You are absolutely beyond “comfortably middle class” with that salary.
Entry-level rich here in the South.
Nawh, not even. The truth is it takes 550k/yr TC to buy a basic house ($1.6M) in exactly the neighborhood where I grew up in scrubby yards and broken sidewalks south San José. In SF, it takes 720k TC to afford a regular house ($2.5M). Boomer and Greatest generations got Prop 13 extra low property taxes (like $1064/y because it's 1.4% on $76k valuation) and then everyone else pays 1.4%/y (14k) on a million+ house at market value.
About 15 years ago it really started to get corporate. Big money came in and created camps with air conditioning, huge RV's no bartering, etc.
Dustin Moskovitz and the like started going and wouldn't dare behave the ordinary peasants, by sleeping in tents, participating in the community, bartering for things.
Heck Zuckerberg took a helicopter there one year.
instead they just threw money at the event so they wouldn't have to do the things that made burning man, burning man.
I think you've picked the wrong target here.
Worth reading Dustin's personal account of his Burning Man experience: https://medium.com/i-m-h-o/radical-inclusion-vs-radical-self... (bear in mind this was written 13 years ago, I'm not sure Dustin would agree with everything stated, but the broad strokes feel correct.)
That post also explains Zuck's attendance. Zuck is not a Burner, it was a one-off visit encouraged by Dustin. Personally I think it was inconsequential in the long run but good for Zuck to have seen it.
The criticism you're raising about money being thrown at the event is broadly valid, but it does not at all apply to how Dustin approached it, IMO. Dustin did precisely what you are suggesting he didn't - slept in a tent, literally cooked and served grilled cheese sandwiches.
(Context: I was in the camp/village, attended 10 years 2009-2018, back once in 2025, have done a lot of playa art... and I also broadly agree with John Law's take.)
I work at a financial company and around 2019, the break room had a magazine called “Meetings” with a front-page article about how burning man and sxsw are the next big thing in corporate culture.
Meetings magazine from 30 Rock is real
I think this is where my head goes when I think of the event: a large portion of the attendees have gone from community members to customers.
What are you talking 'corporate' - there are no corporate sponsors, and people having been coming in with their big camp A/C rvs for 25 years at least.
There's an airport there for 30 years - people have been flying airplanes and helicoptors forever.
Bartering is not a thing at the burn. It intended to be a gift-based event.
Rainbow Gathering is barter-based.
> Heck Zuckerberg took a helicopter there one year.
The vast majority of the people I knew who flew in weren’t rich like Zuck, they just liked flying. It’s the only way to get a wristband that allows you to come and go at will (i.e. to run logistics for a camp) and avoid exodus if you had to leave that day.
15 years ago no one gave a damn about the rich people going to burning man. They were isolated in their camps. We were much more concerned with keeping our Sparkle Ponies alive.
It’s funny the way having money and participating in something “the easy way” removes the coolness / authenticity from the experience.
Curiously, I found this 1995 SFGate article offering a related perspective:
> Many participants tell me this is the last year the event will be bearable before it "goes commercial."
https://www.sfgate.com/style/article/Communal-art-in-the-des...
And funny enough, John Law himself has basically been saying the same thing since the late '90s. He's been shaking his fist at this particular cloud for over twenty-five years, so I'm not sure why an opinion piece like this is even noteworthy at this point.
FWIW, for a lot of us, the magic is still there. Most of the city exists outside of the shiny Instagram influencers that seem to dominate the narrative. We're still there being gross and building shit for the joy of it with our friends.
I always get here early, before the event officially opens, in part to get an up close view of all the art and camps going up.
(I'm still not used to easy internet access at BRC, he says as he browses HN from his camp)
> ...the festival I helped invent 36 years ago. Curiously, I get this interest even though I haven’t set foot in the Black Rock Desert since 1996.
Not doubting the headline conclusion, but I would have expected a better source than someone who hasn't been to Burning Man in literally 30 years. AFAICT, Burning Man was still very well regarded ~20 years ago, long after this founder stopped attending
He also neglected to mention that Larry Harvey attended up through his death, afaik. Or how deeply affected the city was the year Larry died.
Or that the man design was done for so long by a close collaborator of Larry’s. And that the man base has been frequently spectacular both on fire and not.
The historical perspective and old photos are great but I’m not much for the conclusion. I would be willing to bet the title and byline are editorialized by the publisher.
You can still go out there with not much, be new and participate and just smile at some famous or not person also on their way back from the Portos.
There is a lot of money involved, no doubt and there is a lot of bullshit too, like art cars that do fundraisers and take volunteer contributions only to remain largely private vessels for a particular crew, a few celebs etc.
And there’s a lot to not like about the org or how art grants are handled, it’s a big system it has the exploits and nepotism that might infect anything scaled and offering power.
But if you go and do not look closely and just give in small ways none of that would likely be visible to you.
You could have the time of your life. Or not. Which I think suggests the opportunity for adventure and chaos still remains at that thing in the desert.
it’s still the city. the org might be run in a lame way but any time you get too involved in something you see another layer of politics and favoritism and helping friends out that just seems wrong. most people going aren’t at that level and it’s fine. you’ll still have a good time (if you want to)
I think the point GP was making was that the co-founder was basing their judgment secondhand from stories from friends and headlines.
Another bit I found peculiar was the mentions of anarchism while seeming to have a rigid idea of what the event should or should not be. It's certainly far less anarchistic today—placements, permits, law enforcement—but it's not exactly anarchism to say it isn't allowed to evolve to fit the scale and culture of the participants.
Every anarchistic community ends up with rules to ensure things run smoothly. I think anarchism should be viewed as the movement towards less rules, not a movement that allows absolutely no rules. Allocating office desks so that everyone knows where their desk is is just common sense - if you're concerned about people envying the best desks, randomise it every week. You have to mark out roads if you want there to be roads.
Law enforcement was probably there because law enforcement said they'd ban the whole event if law enforcement wasn't there. That's how they typically work.
Anarchism is rules without rulers. Removal of unnecessary hierarchies.
The absurdity of anarchism is thus shown. It always ultimately ends up re-inventing government.
anarchism is no rulers, not no rules. "it always ends up..." please, i would love to hear all these examples you have. burning man isn't anarchism, btw. anarchism rejects all hierarchies, is typically horizontally organized, often ran by consensus though decision making varies by flavor, is inherently anticapitalist. there would be no profit and remuneration would be even across the board. you can see how burning man could never be called anarchist. but some examples for your consideration, ezln doesn't claim it but the way they organize themselves it's largely the same, rojava, cnt-fai/revolutionary spain.
> anarchism […] is inherently anticapitalist
No, it’s not.
I get that your flavor may be, and that’s fine, but your definition is neither the only one or the first.
everyone always insinuates the extreme, see currently the right and left trying to burn down the scary socialists.
Does america need more socialism to to help break the back of this oligarchic fascist state fuck yes. Do I want to live in pure socialism, no, no I do not. I will however hold positions further left than I think we are able to achieve simply to help move the overton window back to some fucking sanity.
We stake out these purely moral positions at the extreme poles because we want to move the concept of where the center actually is, we know we cannot achieve some kind of communist/socialist utopia, but you don't win by negotiating with yourself before you are at the table with the adversary.
san francisco had that cool, edgy, gonzo art scene happening in the 90s. also survival research laboratories and their famous pitching machine, the omnicircus, chicken john, laughing squid, critical mass/commute clot, santarchy/santa con (before it became the weird frat thing it is today). similar things in brooklyn in the '00s like the madagascar institute, black label bike club, idiotarod, etc.
in the 2000s, there was kind of an interesting tech meets countercultural art thing where a lot of the more interesting tech people would pour their disposable income into interesting burning man art projects (nimby's ddi, jabba's sail barge) but it does seem like in recent years with the real sf affordability crisis that came with internet business actually taking off the creativity went down and the money seeking people showed up. i guess that's also true of sf (and brooklyn) more generally.
it was a fun time. i was a swe intern in the mid 90s and would marvel when the engineering team would disappear to the desert for a week and come back with colored hair. my boss drove a psychedelic school bus to work sometimes. in south of market on 6th street in sf, there was a building that had furniture welded onto the exterior like it had all come to life and was trying to escape the building.
I started going in 2002 and have friends who have gone every year since then.
There has been a meme that burning man sucks now and used to be better that entire time.
That doesn't mean the meme is false. It definitely has changed. There's an article in sfgate today that quotes the head of the Death Guild (Thunderdome) camp as saying something like, do people want to carry on the traditions their parents had, or invent their own?
I thought that was a great question. Both are valid paths.
Festivals have changed. People want high speed internet, good food, professional security and not having to put up their own tent.
> People want high speed internet, good food, professional security and not having to put up their own tent.
That's daycare for adults, not an experience.
The others are pretty dependent on what you mean by good food or professional security. But who wants high speed internet at a festival?
> But who wants high speed internet at a festival?
A shocking amount of people
It was better next year.
i went 95-2000 then got cajoled back in 2012. It sucks now. It actually sucks now.
I don’t know anything about burning man except the actor who originally played Dr. Weir on Stargate SG1 was fired (essentially) because she misled the producers about attending it. Tory Higgens did a fine job as her replacement though.
https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=eDriBfoPzsA&t=120s&pp=2AF4kAIB...
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jessica_Steen#Career
From the narrative on Wikipedia, it looks more like she was fired not because she hid the truth, but because she was indeed attending Burning Man and the producers didn't like the idea: "committed to naked drugging in the desert" as opposed to misleading anyone. If she'd told the truth, it'd probably have the same result.
Popularity ruins things?! NO!
I've known this for awhile, since at least 2020. Specifically when they told a documentarian he could film and then threatened litigation he release his film after he had already shot it. He had to blur literally everything at Burning Man but the guy he's following around.
https://www.blurringman.org/blurring-man
Zoinks I mangled that. Late edit:
I've known this for awhile, since at least 2020. Specifically when they told a documentarian he could film and then threatened litigation if he released his film — after he had already shot it. He had to painstakingly blur literally all Burning Man footage except for the guy he's following around.
I don't understand how nostalgia can be applied to Burning Man.
Outside of those few who dedicate themselves to the organization and administration of the event, each burning man is a unique assemblage of thousands of people, different in every way from one year to the next. Except perhaps the location.
Without the different human beings who show up each year, the event would be nothing more than a dust bowl waiting to become a mud pit.
The "soul," if there is one, is the sum total of the expressions those humans bring with them at any given point in time.
Change the humans and you change the expression. So exactly which "soul" does the author long for?
Anything with a soul that gains popularity is doomed to value extraction.
Yep. Las Vegas used to have a soul. Not anymore.
As the author says himself, he hasn’t attended in 30 years. I understand some of the things he’s complaining about, but I don’t think that is the dominant experience of being there.
And yet, I think it’s perfectly reasonable for the founder of something to share his opinions on why he thinks it’s no longer the thing he created.
Both things can be true.
Funny, as it used to be painted people in tents..
https://www.trippingly.net/burning-man-musings/2019/2/1/gree...
I think this has been obvious for many years now.
Indeed. It's hard to draw a specific line, but it's been over a decade.
everything ages and matures and goes through stages of experimentation and conservation. it would be much weirder if it didn't happen.
if you want a young thing, go find a young thing
and he's been complaining ever since they stopped letting him shoot machine guns at teddy bears.
Blackrock used to be pretty wild-west (I was going before Burning Man started), pretty scary stuff at times (a friend once did something silly and hurt himself badly, Clinton was doing something in Reno, the SS heard about it, thought it was nearby and MiB showed up looking hot and bothered in their suits), over time the BLM realised that they needed to police the area a bit more and things got toned down (doesn't help that BM situates itself across multiple law enforcement jurisdictions, these days there's a surfeit of police)
Raise your hand if you remember 'drive-by camp'
> Anarchist
> Name is John Law
Makes sense.
If he has not been there since 1996 then I don't think he has a right to be talking about it like this, honestly, it's kind of sad trash talk.
Maybe he's right but he'd have to articulate it. It's a relatively authentic and vibrant thing. Maybe not as new or quite as punk, but it's 'something'.
“Burning Man is supposed to be about anarchy!”
“Cool, I’m going to fly in on a private plane”
“No not like that”
I mean, if they relinquish their ownership of the plane and joined in with some sort of council that determined how to manage such assets I bet everyone claiming to be an anarchist would be fine with it. Anarchy as a political ideology doesn't mean no rules, it means no rulers.
Burning Man is easy to hate on. I've never been.
But come on. The world kinda sucks. If a bunch of people want to go to the desert with no cell phone service and just do their thing, why do we care? If some of them need an RV to do it, and they aren't charging others, so what? That's awesome, and life would be better if more people had the ability to do their own flavors of Burning Man.
> If a bunch of people want to go to the desert with no cell phone service and just do their thing, why do we care?
https://www.sfchronicle.com/opinion/openforum/article/burnin...
> ...and life would be better if more people had the ability to do their own flavors of Burning Man.
I'm biased and a bit amusingly jaded because I left the US many years ago and have been living overseas for a long time, so take my next paragraph with that context.
Have you been to a Mexican ranchero wedding that lasts several days? Enjoyed a weekend BBQ in a Filipino province? Been invited by a bunch of 60 and 70-somethings in a small town in Vietnam who don't speak English to sing karaoke with them?
Enjoying life doesn't have to be a monumental, once-a-year event, and it shouldn't be.
You can't just post an article about pollution and use that as a trump card.
The pollution that comes from the Burning Man artwork, which is the crux of that article, is less than one plane from JFK to SFO. If we're going to complain about anything, the flights to Burning Man dwarf the actual event. But even then, the week of Burning Man, only 0.03% of travel will be people going to BM.
I get it, 70,000 people in one spot creates trash and pollution. But we all are, every minute of every day. In the grand scheme of things, Burning Man is _not_ the problem.
Why can't everyone just do what they want without us taking it to the extremes? I agree meeting locals is a ton of fun and should be a part of everyone's life. But if a bunch of people want to go to a desert and hang out for a week, and they clean up after themselves, why do you care?
> The pollution that comes from the Burning Man artwork, which is the crux of that article...
Did you even read the article? It stated very clearly:
> With organizers themselves estimating that Burning Man emits 100,000 tons of carbon every year, it is clear things cannot stay the same on the playa.
100,000 tons total. Please don't cherry-pick one part of the article to make a point.
> ...and they clean up after themselves...
Except, if you actually did the research, you would know that there are lots of reports of trash being dumped in nearby towns, including Reno and Tahoe. It's not the straightforward "they clean up after themselves" you make it out to be.
https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2022/sep/07/burning-man-...
https://www.rgj.com/story/life/arts/burning-man/2023/09/06/b...
> Why can't everyone just do what they want without us taking it to the extremes?
Who took anything to an extreme? Most of my comment was pointing out that in much of the world, particularly in places where people have way less, they find a way to enjoy life and have fun without events that have the environmental impact of a Burning Man.
I'm not calling for Burning Man to be banned. But what I think is extreme is the idea that, because the "world kinda sucks", the solution is for people to take a few days out of the year to go into the desert and let loose. Have a monthly BBQ with friends. Sing karaoke on the weekend. Take a hike every Sunday. Those things will contribute way more to a durable enjoyment of life than a Burning Man.
>Burning Man is _not_ the problem
Burning Man is completely discretionary, you need to compute the total discretionary carbon footprint, and then the BM carbon footprint
Okay, then it's at about 0.0008% of discretionary global emissions.
If we're going down the list of things to get upset about, Burning Man is pretty far down the list.
Let people have fun.
I looked a bit into the author. His friend unfortunately died at Burning Man in 1996, as did two other people. Since then, he left and has been an advocate for shutting down Burning Man. They fought over the name for 10 years after that.
Regional burns are a thing, and they're pretty awesome.
They can be, but unfortunately the org has threatened to revoke official regional burn status unless they followed all the same rules, in particular, that children be allowed. There used to be some leeway on that, and there were really wonderful regional burns that did not permit kids. They were forced to, which resulted in the "real" burn being in a small taped off area.
Seems insane to me to think kids should be at burns.
I usually camp where I can get some distance from the noise, which means I hang out with the burner parents and their kids. It's really great to see all of the ways that burners adapt their art so that kids can participate, and the kids bring a pretty excellent energy also.
Most recently I was navigating this wooden maze, lots of tight spaces and odd bends necessary to get through it. Part way through I encountered a bunch of kids who weren't tall enough to get over a ledge (they navigated the rest of the thing with ease). I made myself into stairs for them and they completed it. Later I had an epic foam sword fight with the same bunch. It was super fun.
I've never been to the big burn, so maybe I'm just missing out on the magic of whatever you mean by the "real" burn (although many of the people at my regional say it isn't worth it), but I don't think anything was lost by having the kids around.
Their parents are convinced that it's raising a child in default society that's the more dangerous thing, and after talking with several of them I'm convinced as well.
I’m pretty extreme ideologically, and that carries over to parenting. I would consider taking my child and requiring that it be allowed strikes me as an enormous red flag.
That’s because it’s easier to recruit kids into cults or whatever
> That’s because it’s easier to recruit kids into cults or whatever
That's what Sunday School is for.
I lived in SF at the time of the original burns on Baker Beach and heard about them but I was too lame and isolated to ever participate but followed their antics (and the Cacophony Society) from afar.
The universe arranged for me to go ten years ago and I found the experience magical. There's an exhibit that shows how each wave of newcomers has destroyed burning man which I found to be a cheeky take on its evolution.
The kids I saw there were doing kid friendly stuff and them being allowed there was clearly to allow their parents to come without having to leave them behind.
There's plenty to hate about it but in the end it's about people coming together to have a good time, and there's nothing wrong with that.
Or school, including university/college
Burning Man is also a quintessential example of "what if we just did a cool thing?" - a philosophy that more of us need to try following.
good riddance
I always thought the whole point of burning man was to forfeit your soul anyway?
Honestly, a pretty incredible article. Yeah, this is what happens. And even so, as he said himself, the newbies continue to find themselves and the proles continue to gather to connect and reconnect.
I imagine many here feel convicted because they see themselves in Law’s descriptions of the well-heeled elite, and they resent Law for saying they are not transgressive instigators, anarchic fire starters, and autonomous free zone inhabitants.
Y’all. Be comfortable with who you are. Most of us just want good money, an awesome time with cool computer shit to do, and friends and family who love us. It’s okay not to be a revolutionary. What’s not okay is to trick yourself into believing you are one when it couldn’t be further from the truth.
Here’s to the revolutionaries - I get to live a more grounded life because of their willingness to live outside the lines.
As someone who is just now learning about burning man, it reminded me a lot of Fight Club (1999). And it turns out the author belonged to some of the clubs behind it, namely Cacophony Society/Suicide Club.
There seems to be a bunch of rules to the event, like the explicit 10 rules of chaos mentioned in the article, but also more implicit rules like "a wooden man must burn".
Fwiw, in the book/movie, the drift of the original spirit of the movement is a central theme, as is the loss of personal control over the evolving movement.
Festivals are big business now. Boomers and Gen Xers have money to spend and spend they do trying to recapture their youth. Hundreds of dollars for passes. Hundreds more spent on food and drink. Times tens or hundreds of thousands of attendees.
Quite right but it would be nice if the kids would invent their own things instead of whining about how expensive doing "boomer things" is nowadays!
Where are your modern alternative festis or something else? Where is the the modern counter culture? What on earth is a counter culture nowadays?
Its fucking doom scrolling shite that my peers dump on you!
Nothing can maintain its essence over time, things change and morph. If you want something scrappy you’re going to have to start over with something new until it too eventually ends up the same way.
Build A 300-Mile Wall Around SF During Burning Man
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PO_r6ndZRZY&t=1s
>A community effort to construct a 300-mile wall in one week and prevent Burning Man attendees from returning to the Bay Area.
>"I'm asking for your help crowdfunding the most ambitious Burning Man project ever a wall that's built around the entire bay area during the week of Burning Man."
I rather hop a freight train than celebrate pseudo-non-consumerism consumerism with mostly techbros, yuppies, and addictive substance excessivists. Sure there are still some cool burners but it's just way too big. It's a simulacrum of its former self trying to recapture lightning in a bottle like a "blockbuster" bad trilogy franchise built around a good, scrappy film. Better to go my own way.
burning man is cringe and you can downvote me if you want. it just proves my point.
Everything small becomes big, and then gets enshittificated
I don't quite agree, there's a lot of small things that don't get big / are shitty enough on their own. Agreed with the rest though.
only a matter of time until it's "burning man proudly presented by palantir"
Don’t some billionaires go there with their servants and bring some porta-mansions or something?
Yea I wouldn't be caught dead going there today. Looks pretentious.
Burning man is one of the biggest environmental disasters to happen by humans for pure entertainment.
Leave No Trace.
Worse than rolling coal? Worse than golf courses? Worse than cruiselines?