LA Weekly

The past two days have brought some weather to Black Rock City that has definitely enriched the experience. On Thursday whiteout conditions raged for hours in the afternoon, obliterating many structures and coating everything with a generous coating of dust. I'm writing in one now, in fact, nestled in the relative comfort of the Burning Man Regional Info Center, where there's both bandwidth and friendly people. I can't see farther than four feet in front of me. But I can hear a nice house beat coming from some camp a block down the street.
One big story here, and there are many, is about the corporate influence the Burning Man organization has allowed to seep in to the event. Some people accuse Burning Man of selling out; others worry entrepreneurism will ruin the party's charm. The organization counters that without corporate involvement, Burning Man will become an isolated relic of a moribund party culture, not unlike the hippie movement of the ‘60s.
At a talk today at Otter Oasis, I understood what both sides meant.
First there was Bob Noble, an architect with the San Diego Green Building Council, who assessed the spirit of the moment and went with it: He even got a round of applause when he announced that he’d left his PowerPoints at home. Noble told about new photovoltaic technology, the “thin film” that should be on every RV in the country; he bragged about San Diego’s Solar Forest, which uses the principles of biomimicry to provide both shade and power.
Next was Matt Chiakas [not sure about that spelling, sorry], who facilitates a movement based in Santa Barbara, California to convert the country to 100 percent renewable energy by 2033, “Fossil Free in ’33.” “We’re actually trying to do it by 2030,” he admitted, “but we decided to give ourselves three extra years because it’s a tough thing to do. Plus, it rhymes.”
This is all good and fun: Fossil Free may be a story to follow in the future. But I had gone to the talk hoping to hear Mark Cheney of Renewable Energy MMA, the firm that donated the 30 kilowatt solar array that power the man (which is back up, by the way). Cheney didn't show up; in his stead was a public relations expert who explained the necessity of public relations and talked about "planting memes" to address global warming. "The only reason we haven't solved global warming is that we haven't tried," she said.
At that point, I got up and left. Not because I disagreed with her -- I did, in fact, in a big way. But the talk had started a half-hour late, the guy I'd come to see wasn't there, and I wanted to get over to see Daniel Pinchbeck speak at Entheon Village by 3:30.
"I hope this isn't a protest," the woman said abruptly as I walked away. I assured her it wasn't. "I'm just getting a little paranoid after reading the discussions on ePlaya."
The defensiveness seemed misplaced, as well as a misunderstanding of the environment. People come and go here; they drift in and out, and there's a lot to do: You could be busy every second and not see all you came to see; I always go home with a deep sense of regret over everything I missed. You get tired and overstimulated if you get too ambitious, and the Playa is not the place to sit through a talk out of obligation.
That’s what you do in a corporate environment, though, and that’s one of the hazards of corporate life: Too much has been automated, too much protocol put in place that doesn’t matter. And if that takes hold at Burning Man, it will be a relic for sure.
Whiteout still rages. It’s kind of nice, actually, like a snow day in Minnesota, where I grew up. All I can do is hang out in this shelter until it subsides and see if anyone has a beer they want to share. Or a vodka, or a glass of wine, or . . . I’m not picky.
I'll add links and pics as I can later. It's hell getting a signal.

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