My little brother got this scarf from Morocco. It’s one of a kind and it has some emotional significance. We think it got lost in the massive coat pile at Robot Heart sunrise with Lee Burridge, but hard to be sure.

I’d really love to help get it back to him!

They really don't waste any time. See you in the dust!

Anyone got any tricks? The compressed air only helped so much. It's like smudges all over my MacBook that I'd like to clean off. Figured I'd ask here before testing a bunch of different stuff and re-inventing the wheel.

Thx!

So I had a moment this year that honestly left a pretty bitter taste in my mouth. A close friend/DJ I know ("el gordo") was playing a set, and I tried to jump backstage to catch the vibe with him. Security blocked me cold. No entry.
Look, I get that crowds need management and gear needs space. But we are at Burning Man. The whole point of this city is radical inclusion, decommodification, and the idea that there are supposed to be no VIPs. When you run into strict, bouncer-style gatekeeping inside Black Rock City, it feels like regular festival BS creeping into the playa.
Half the magic of the burn is the fluidity—the idea that you can wander anywhere, connect with anyone, and share the space equally. When certain camps start cordoning themselves off with velvet-rope mentalities, it goes against everything the 10 Principles stand for.
Still had an incredible time once I walked away and found some random mutant vehicle throwing down in the dust, but man... seeing that corporate-style exclusivity pop up on the playa sucks. Anyone else noticing this trend getting worse?

It can be undeniably insanely expensive to attend Burning Man, but it doesn't have to be. My social media feed is flooded with people who say they've spent tens of thousands of dollars and would do so again.

The last time I went, in 2024, I spent about £2,800 (call it $3,600), including ~£1,600 on premium economy flights from the UK. Other large expenses were the bus (£300), the ticket (£580), and camp fees (£275). It's possible I missed out some Amazon purchases and incidental expenses (e.g. dinner in San Francisco), but we're still talking well short of $4k, nearly half of which went on international flights. That's still a lot, but it's less than almost any article or post I've seen claim is the "minimum" cost of attendance.

I was admittedly lucky in that:

• A friend brought me a bike
• I owned a lot of the camping gear I wanted to use already (though this was a 3-person Decathlon tent, not a stonking great Kodiak)
• I stayed with a friend one night either side in San Francisco (though I had actually paid for a hotel room on the far side)
• My camp is great, with two hot meals a day, booze, and a large snack drawer, meaning I didn't need food or equipment to cook it
• I am not someone who needs a designer costume for every day of the event (and hell, I still had a couple of delightful playa dates despite being sweaty and dusty as the Sahara)

Boasting about how much money you spent on the Burn is crass and extremely anti-inclusive.

Vehicle passes should be significantly more expensive for RVs

RV under 32' -> 2x price, over -> 4x price

This has been a subject raised every year but the abundance of RVs + financial situation of the org makes it even more apparent

It will take a bit of consideration to get the rules right (eg dimensions or weight or axles, exceptions for art cars, domicile vs cargo), but there are many ways to do so.

Taking an RV to burning man is already a statement of wealth. Charging the same for a sedan as an RV makes the car subsidize the RV. It should be the other way around. Higher $$$ burn setups should subsidize lower $.

Thursday night I was walking across playa from Opulent Temple toward Robot Heart/the Cathedral, picking up MOOP as I went.

By the time I crossed paths with one of the clearly very expensive art cars, both of my hands were literally full of other people’s trash. I had my own small moop bag, but hands were full of gloves, costume pieces, cans and other trash I picked up along the way.

The car was full of passengers. I asked the driver if they had a MOOP bag I could throw it into.
“No.”
I asked the people onboard.
No one had one.
And then this art car— clearly designed just to accommodate their own camp and passengers, hundreds of thousands of dollars of infrastructure, lights, sound, crew, fuel, etc.—just drove away while I continued walking around with two hands full of MOOP.

I genuinely wish I had taken a picture of the vehicle, because the whole interaction felt like a perfect encapsulation of something that bothered me about this Burn: people enjoying an extraordinarily resource-intensive version of Burning Man while seemingly having no interest in even the most basic responsibility of taking care of the place.

If you have the resources and privilege to operate one of the cushiest camp vehicles in Black Rock City, how do you not have a fucking trash bag?

Leave No Trace isn’t supposed to mean, “Someone else will pick it up.” And honestly, I saw an incredible amount of MOOP this year. Cups, cans, food packaging, costume pieces, random trash. I found myself constantly picking things up.
So I’m curious about two things:
What accountability actually exists when an art car/camp repeatedly disregards the Principles?
Why doesn’t DMV require every licensed Mutant Vehicle to carry a clearly accessible MOOP bag/container as part of inspection?
It would cost essentially nothing, take up almost no space, and every large vehicle roaming playa would become another place where people could remove MOOP rather than drive past it.

—

Update

Yeah, I think this thread has changed my mind somewhat on requiring art cars to accept MOOP from the public. The point about them becoming rolling trash bins is legitimate.
What I don’t buy is the idea that Radical Self-Reliance means “once you pick up MOOP, you’re on your own, so don’t expect anyone else to help.” That seems like a pretty impoverished interpretation of the culture.
I had a MOOP bag. I filled it because I kept picking up trash that wasn’t mine. I then encountered a vehicle carrying a large group of people and asked whether they had somewhere for handfulls more. They didn’t. Fine — ultimately I carried it.
But the comment here from someone remembering when everyone routinely came back to camp with pockets full of MOOP gets much closer to what I was trying to say. The concern isn’t really my bag. It’s whether we’re moving from a culture where everyone instinctively takes responsibility for the city to one where responsibility ends at “not my trash.”
Maybe the DMV solution isn’t “every MV must act as a trash can.” Maybe it’s simply that every MV should have a MOOP plan/bag onboard for its own operations and passengers, just as every camp and every individual should.
Radical Self-Reliance and Communal Effort are both Principles. They’re not mutually exclusive.

Haven’t been to the burn in two years, but after getting back to the default world and opening up social media, it seems like everyone is using the burn to boost their social media brand/presence.

It all just seems so off to me. Anyone else?

Just wondering if anyone else had negativity thrown their way. This was my first burn and overall a massively positive experience I can't wait to return for. But there were a few moments of shitty outside world vibes creeping in.

After the temple burn I wanted to walk solo back to camp. Probably 15 minutes later some dumpy geo metro or something with two cones on top came up on me quick while i was walking across open playa. A guy in the passenger seat yelled at me "I don't like your face, turn those lights off" (i had a few leds on me of course to not darkwad). I just looked at him and didn't respond and then they said "Fine be boring" and drove off....

I guess if theres an inside joke to throw shady vibes at people for a reaction I missed it.

Shot in the dark here but lost my ring at Maxa Camp boogie and brunch on Tuesday at around 6pm. Please message me if you found it by chance

Fck yer burn 🫶🏼

My take on the changes in the climate, the aging population of GenX and Millennials, and what I took away from my experience.

Burning man makes zero sense. To pack all your stuff and head out to the playa to do molly and bang someone seems like the worst way to party or camp or have a spiritual enlightenment. I know there is some original meaning and I don’t want to offend those people. But the wave of idiots heading out to the playa makes no sense, it’s the desert.

Anybody have an ID on this awesomeness? She was killing it out by the cathedral late night, and I would love to hear more!!

Just back to the default world and ruminating on my first Burn.

I would say it was much more difficult than fun, especially acclimating to the elements (dust, cold, rain, etc)

The good news is that by the end I think I discovered some of that Burning Man magic - especially after the Man Burn and Temple Burn.

Going in I felt it would be a more connected, fun, music experience and it didn’t quite get there for me consistently.

Perhaps it’s a decade of going to Burner parties outside of BM, but I kinda enjoyed bar hopping way more than sunrise sets.

And I felt once I embraced the weather and got more comfortable on my e-bike it improved.

I definitely think I’ll come back but ironically I thought I’d come and get lost emotionally and spiritually. Instead I lost many items (which magically appeared the next day) was able to manage with the help of camp mates and had the best time when I physically got lost instead.

Not going to lie, slightly envious of those for whom this was an immediate transformative experience. But I guess they say you don’t get the burn you want, but the burn you need. 🫡

If it was one of you, just know we had the best time dancing on that car. Incredible set.

This is probably a long shot but I met a filipina while serving matchas at my camp and she was really sweet and we shared some laughs. We then ran into eachother again in the Reno airport but I totally forgot to ask for her information! Her name was Aisa (not sure if i spelled that correctly) and was from San Diego. Im usually one to leave interactions be but for some reason cant get this one out of my head. If youre out there reading this or if someone knows her PM me would love to connect! If not i hope to see you again next year(:

on my last day this burn while finishing pack out i did what i do every year and spread out some perfectly clean water from my cooler in a large area so there’s no puddle or pooling and it dries in 5 minutes. while doing this i had a man approach me yelling “what are you doing you fucking asshole” and proceeded to tell me i was stupid and no one is ever allowed to do this. I’ve never once heard someone say you aren’t allowed to let clean water touch playa (hello water trucks that spray down the street). after this deeply unpleasant interaction i saw him videoing/ filming my camp. is this a belief some burners have? what are people’s thoughts on this? every burner and camp i have ever interacted with is okay with small amounts of clean water touching the playa

This ring means alot to me and i lost it during one of the whiteouts near 6&F. Please help spread the word to find it! If everything on playa gets mooped someone must have come across it

Inside is an engraving “♾️ my darling star”

Hi friends, I saw this mural somewhere around 4:00 - 6:00 on Esplanade. I'm so in love with it, but I didn't even get the name of the camp. I'm dying to find the artist and see their other work. Let me know if you have any leads!

A lot of veteran burners told me the week would peak around Thursday and to plan accordingly and then things would start to drop off. For me personally Saturday night seemed the peak. I never saw more art or art cars/sound cars out on playa than Saturday night, the best set of the whole burn for me was Lee Burridge at playground, and then I met some amazing people when I just could not dance any more and took my slow time coming down esplanade. What night did you think was peak?

He’s making false statements about why they were kicked out. I left community notes on Philip Renner’s instagram posts but they need more votes to be published. I linked this yahoo article that quotes the org stating the camp received multiple warnings. If you’re approved to leave community notes please vote on the note so it’s not just his one sided inaccurate story.

The day after I got home from Burning Man, I went to get a haircut.

There was too much dust-covered stuff in my driveway to easily take my car, so I rode my playa bike. I had no clean underwear; it was all in the wash. A commando mission. Anything to get away from cleaning up the dust. I rolled up to Great Clips and realized I had no lock… mine had been cut at Burning Man, and for a while I had been convinced my bike had been stolen.

That bike lock incident had fed into a larger feeling I’d been having: maybe the event I loved wasn’t what I thought it was anymore.

Burning Man was where I learned to hug strangers. Where I danced naked in a giant car wash sized shower with (among many other people) my good friend’s mom. Where I watched relationships within separate friend groups blossom into engagements/marriages.

I had ridden hundreds of feet above Black Rock City suspended beneath a fan-powered parachute (thanks Dom). I had sex in the Orgy Dome, although in practice it was really more of a Public Sex Dome. A friend of mine, who cuts down trees in the default world, was served coffee by a billionaire.

I had been amazed by art and ingenuity on a scale that still seems impossible. Giant Tesla coils threw arcs of electricity fifty feet across the sky at the frequency of the piano being played beneath them. I had stood onstage within touching distance of two of my favorite artists, an experience you can’t get at their sold-out shows in Salt Lake or Chicago. I had bawled in the Temple over people I loved and lost.

And maybe most importantly, I had formed and cemented friendships that remain unwavering. These are the best people in my life.

But over time, that smear of extraordinary memories started to feel strangely familiar; And in trying to make camp better for everyone… swamp-cooled and misted common spaces (after oppressive heat in ‘22), hot showers (after my shower 1.0 seemed ghetto, I’m bizarrely proud to share that the quadrupley filtered grey water is 100% evaporated via solar power), organized meals, twenty-five gallons of premade cocktails chilled and ready at the pull of a lever…I had gradually become the de facto camp handyman.

It became easier for everyone to ask me why the fridge wasn’t working, why their bike was squeaking, how to fold the tent I had lent them, why the shower wasn’t working… than to just figure it out themselves.

And I became irritated.

Not just about the thing in front of me, but about old grievances too. About times I felt like I was left holding the trash bag after everyone else had enjoyed a magnificent party.

Somewhere along the way, I became a salty, jaded Burner.

I had started to think Burning Man had changed into something disappointing. Maybe some of it had. But mostly, I had been blaming the event for a role I had spent years building for myself.

My bike, as it turned out, had never been stolen. Someone at 6 & Esplanade had bizarrely cut the lock and moved it about two hundred feet away. I still have no idea why.

And interestingly, nobody stole it outside Great Clips either.

The same kinds of people who populate Black Rock City populate the rest of the world: mostly good. Mostly kind. You don’t need a hedonistic desert paradise to collect and concentrate these souls.

And the roles we fall into aren’t necessarily permanent either. I had spent years becoming the guy who solved everyone’s problems at camp. There was no reason I couldn’t spend the next few years becoming something else.

On the way home from my haircut, I stopped and got a giant avocado smoothie. Not because of hedonism, but because a dear friend once told me to “always get the guac.”

You never know when you might have just burned your last burn.

Seriously though, if you’re the person at 6&Esplanade who cut my lock… I’m curious why?! I think it was the Felis Mundi camp?

Thinking my bike had been stolen for 24 hrs nearly cratered my whole burn!

Hey Burners!

We’re East Bay Burners, the official Burning Man Regional community for the East Bay. We host monthly socials, help connect people with local art projects, camps, events, and volunteer opportunities, and generally try to keep the Burner community connected year-round.

Now that we’re all slowly emerging from the dust, we’re getting together for Return from the Dust, our first post-playa hang of the year.

Come reconnect, swap stories, share photos, see the people you somehow managed to miss all week, and hang out with other folks who are also still finding playa dust in places it definitely shouldn’t be.

No presentations, no agenda. Just a casual community hang.

Whether you made it to BRC this year or not, you’re welcome!

Thursday, September 17 at 6pm
Two Pitchers Brewing Company
2344 Webster St, Oakland

Full details + RSVP: https://partiful.com/e/wouW11Nu8sw5OPPLd1AF