Burning Man needs a competitor

[nasu_dengaku]

Monopolies tend to stifle innovation.  It's true whether the monopoly is making software or radical-self-reliance festivals

Comments

Secondary reply to Facebook

[acydrayn]

One event that I think is slowly catching on, because it is even more difficult of an event to get to/organize/run is the Autonomous Mutant Festival. It's not a hugely kept secret but since I haven't gone I didn't want to talk about it too explicitly on Facebook.

http://www.mutantfest.org/

[madbard]

Ephemerisle looked promising as a kind of Drowning Man equivalent. Hopefully the new anarchic version will be able to build on the momentum of year one.

[serolynne]

I believe some of the BM regionals are starting to become not just smaller and local versions of Burning Man itself, but a sort of competition. I know I'm starting to be inclined to favor regionals to the big burn itself.

[ferrouswheel]

Yeah, I was about to mention this.

Particularly given the cost for non-USAians, myself and my partner went to Afrika Burns last year for a different experience (it was awesome in it's own way, very similar, but also very different). It seems a waste to return to the same place every year for those that spend thousands to get there... although I would definitely like to attend the main Burn once more before I or it dies.

I've been the KiwiBurn multiple times, Afrika Burns once, and the main Burn once. Given my potential relocation to HK, I'll probably try to find the fabled Chinese Burn ... which just has a huge cognitive dissonance for me given their culture, but hey, that'll make it a unique experience!

[merovingian]

There's also Meadow Muffin, Barter Fair, the Rainbow Gathering, the Love Parade, and a few others out there.

[nasu_dengaku]

None of those other festivals appear to have the same level of creative production or cultural impact as Burning Man. Maybe they have an intensity to them that makes them special in their own way, but I can't discern that from their websites.

[merovingian]

No, I think you're right on that.

However, as I thought about this more, another thought hit me: maybe Burning Man isn't optimizing for quality of art, and maybe instead it's optimizing, increasingly, on broad appeal.

[radven]

Meadow Muffin? Haven't heard of that one...

[sol3]

I can happily report that I have seen a couple of large art sculptures being worked on at nimby that are going right to installations (one in Santa rosa, the other to a library in idintknowheristan) and were never even remotely I tended for burningman.