Burning Man: Sowing the Seeds for Organizing

One of the most interesting post scripts to my research is that Burning Man volunteers have learned to establish and run their own formal organizations. For instance, when I studied the Burning Man organization, one of its departments included the Black Rock Gazette, which published a daily newspaper. (I published an article in the “Decompression” edition back in 2003, which you can access here.) Not only did Black Rock Gazette volunteers work on late-breaking news on the playa under primitive conditions, but they also drove to Reno to pick up the papers from the printers and rushed them back to Black Rock City each day. In 2005, organizers decided to eliminate the Black Rock Gazette.

However, Black Rock City still has a newspaper! Former Black Rock Gazette volunteers formed their own organization and newspaper, the Black Rock Beacon. If you’re interested in volunteering for them, you can find out more about their activities here.