Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

I co-founded Burning Man. The festival has lost its soul

sfstandard.com

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

101–110 of 128 posts

Re: I co-founded Burning Man. The festival has lost its soul

#101

Post by esseph »

TZubiri wrote: post #95
dhosek wrote: post #88

Earlier quoted context omitted.

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…

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.

Re: I co-founded Burning Man. The festival has lost its soul

#102

Post by esseph »

HWR_14 wrote: post #82
TitaRusell wrote: post #55

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Festivals have changed. People want high speed internet, good food, professional security and not having to put up their own tent.

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

Re: I co-founded Burning Man. The festival has lost its soul

#103

Post by Ancapistani »

EPWN3D wrote: post #78
aprilthird2021 wrote: post #34

Earlier quoted context omitted.

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

300k is a huge amount of money if you have no dependents. Otherwise it's comfortably middle class, but that's it.

Entry-level rich here in the South.

Re: I co-founded Burning Man. The festival has lost its soul

#104

Post by Ancapistani »

vegenaise wrote: post #63
psunavy03 wrote: post #57

Earlier quoted context omitted.

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…

> 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.

Re: I co-founded Burning Man. The festival has lost its soul

#105

Post by Ancapistani »

cassonmars wrote: post #13
__MatrixMan__ wrote: post #7

Earlier quoted context omitted.

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…

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.

Re: I co-founded Burning Man. The festival has lost its soul

#106

Post by TZubiri »

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.

Re: I co-founded Burning Man. The festival has lost its soul

#107

Post by jesse_dot_id »

jesse_dot_id wrote: post #37

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.

Re: I co-founded Burning Man. The festival has lost its soul

#108

Post by davkan »

EPWN3D wrote: post #78
aprilthird2021 wrote: post #34

Earlier quoted context omitted.

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

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.

Re: I co-founded Burning Man. The festival has lost its soul

#110

Post by cromka »

ost-ing wrote: post #90
cromka wrote: post #60

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 th…

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…

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...
Post reply on HN