3 ms·
It's a little more than that. All the BM principles are there and necessary. In particular there's no typical "market", as BM runs neither on any form of money,
by H8crilA 7y ago
It's a little more than that. All the BM principles are there and necessary. In particular there's no typical "market", as BM runs neither on any form of money, nor on bartering, but instead on unconditional gifting.
- soneca 7y agoFrom what I read (never been there), "unconditional" does not seem the right word. There seems to be a social rule that a camp is expected to gift. So everyone there is gifting on the condition that everyone else is gifting too.
- H8crilA 7y agoSome camps don't gift much, and that's fine. But yeah the whole setup only works because so many people are giving things. For starters there would be no artwork if people didn't give - artwork set up in the playa or on a mutant vehicle is also a gift. It is unconditional in the sense that you just give without asking for anything in return.
- chachachoney 7y agoDrastic oversimplification. Many of the showcase playa art pieces are funded by grants supplied by the org. Also, while it contradicts the codified principles, there are no shortage of attendees who believe that the gifting thing is reciprocal/transactional and not unconditional.
- chachachoney 7y agoBM runs on a ton of conventional capital, both through the org and through the corporations that are the largest theme camps. Aspects of the experience a person has attending Burning Man, happen sans a traditional US dollar based market, though one could argue that all of those forces do carry over even if people aren't exchanging dollars on the playa.