Dear Trevor,

Thank you for all your hard work as a camp to bring your best to Burning Man for Black Rock City 2024: Curiouser & Curiouser! Theme camps, like the art, mutant vehicles, and creative contributions of so many, are what make Black Rock City vibrant and create the space for connection. We’re pleased to inform you that Mycodelic Forest is in Good Standing with the Placement Team as a Theme Camp, which means you met all or most of the criteria listed below to be in Good Standing. Detailed descriptions of the Criteria to be in Good Standing can be found here. 

What does your Good Standing mean?

Good Standing means you are eligible for Stewards Sale tickets and future placement as a returning theme camp. In order to remain in Good Standing, your camp must attend Black Rock City again as your camp sometime in the next three years. That means your camp can take this year and next year off and retain your Good Standing if you wish. You do not have to return next year to maintain your standing, and we do encourage breaks so you can rest and make space for other theme camps. Please read this story in the Burning Man Journal, “Adapting to Growth and Change in Black Rock City,” to see why we’re encouraging theme camps to take breaks.

What are the criteria to be in Good Standing?

1. Did your camp show up and use your reserved space?
2. Did your camp do what you said you were going to do on your questionnaire?  (Interactivity & frontage available to the entire Burning Man community) This criteria only applies to Theme Camps.  
3. Did your camp uphold our community’s principles and cultural norms? (including neighborliness, keeping sound within set limits, easily resolving any boundary disputes that arise, and being public and inclusive)
4. Did your camp honor our Decommodification principle?
5. Was your camp a strain on Burning Man’s organizational resources? (requiring extra attention or energy from Rangers, DPW, the Playa Restoration team, and others)
6. How were your camp’s MOOP results from the Playa Restoration team?
7. Did your camp abide by the terms of your Setup Access Passes?

How did we arrive at your standing?

After each event, the Placement team collects and reviews feedback from the community and other Burning Man Project departments. Feedback comes through various sources including direct communication from individuals, notes from Placement’s Exploration & Engagement Research Squad (PEERS), the public feedback from the Black Rock City 2024: Post-event Survey, and Placement’s Neighborhood Feedback Form.

The “Post-playa Report” that is expected from all camps also gives you a chance to let us know how things went including any successes and challenges you acknowledged. We also acknowledge that the information we collect has limits. All of these pieces of information come together to get the most holistic picture of your camp possible to arrive at your final camp standing for the year.

Feedback Snapshots

We are offering snapshots at the end of this email that share some of the highlights of feedback we’ve received. Not every camp has specific feedback, and that’s okay if you don’t. If you do have feedback, we hope it helps you receive the kudos you deserve and allows you to reflect on the things you could improve upon. 

If your Theme Camp had MOOP discovered by the Playa Restoration Team, details can be found in an email sent on December 3 with the subject, “Leave No Trace Results for Mycodelic Forest.”

Next Steps

Please be sure to fill out Placement’s Statement of Intent through your Burner Profile for 2025 to let us know if you plan to return or take the year off by Thursday, January 16, 2025 before 12pm (noon) Pacific Time. The SOI can be found in your Burner Profile under the BRC Participation page. More information on the SOI can be found in our FAQ. 

If your camp WILL RETURN in 2025…

We’ll need to know your estimated camp size and number of Stewards Sale tickets you would like to purchase in March. We’d also like to know some basic information about your plans for the forthcoming event including any changes to your interactivity.

If your camp WILL NOT RETURN in 2025 and you’d like to hold your standing…

Fill out a handful of questions in the SOI for your camp to formally inform us that you will be taking 2025 off. If you do not fill out the SOI, we will assume you are skipping the 2025 event. 

• Any camp that has been in good standing for at least 3 events as a theme camp will be guaranteed at least the same number of tickets you most recently received as a camp if your camp returns within the next two years.
• If you don’t meet the 3-year requirement for guaranteed placement and tickets, your good standing will be held for up to 2 years. You will be eligible as a returning camp to receive tickets, but the amount will be determined upon your return.

Note: Completing the SOI will give you access to tickets, but you must still complete the Placed Camp Questionnaire that opens in February for your camp to be placed in BRC. 

Thank you for all you have contributed to Black Rock City in 2024! 

The BRC Placement Team

[email protected]

Mycodelic Forest’s 2024 Snapshots

Neighborhood Feedback 

Placement collects neighbor feedback through the annual Neighborhood Feedback Form that we send out to all camp leaders in September, your self-submitted Post-playa Report, and from direct contact on playa or by email. The responses are aggregated from these sources. 

Favorite Camp

Not all camps received a shoutout as a favorite camp and many delightful experiences may never get mentioned. We do not view the results as representative and are sharing this so that you can get some sense of how you were viewed by other participants. 

• [Number of times your camp was mentioned as a favorite camp]: No mentions

• [What aspects of your camp’s interactivity were appreciated?] (All text responses are included, separated by a vertical bar. Not all survey respondents chose to elaborate.) 

N/A

Non-Interactive and Un-neighborly Camps

People inform us if there were any camps that appeared to not provide interactivity or behaved in an un-neighborly fashion. Multiple mentions from the same camp were tallied as one.

• [Number of times your camp was mentioned as…]
  • “non-interactive”:  No mentions
  • “un-neighborly behavior”: No mentions

• [What specific behaviors were cited as un-neighborly?]

(Survey respondents could choose from a multi-select list. All responses were tallied and included. Not all survey respondents chose to pick from the list.): N/A

• [Number of complaints for Music/sound too loud (i.e. so loud that you can’t have a conversation if you were standing in the middle of the street in front of the camp)] N/A

Placement’s Exploration and Engagement Research Squad (PEERS)

Placement’s Exploration and Engagement Research Squad (PEERS) is made up of volunteers from all over Black Rock City who visit theme camps and neighborhoods. Many are theme camp organizers themselves and contribute their time because they love getting to know other camps. PEERS are not evaluators and do not provide ratings for camps during their visit. Because they visit only once and visits are brief, we understand that their observations are not necessarily representative of your entire camp. 

[Number of other camps that named your camp as a favorite to PEERS?] 1 mentions

[Did PEERS volunteers rate your camp as…] 

• “open and inviting”: Yes
• “friendly and welcoming to all”: Yes
• “having obvious frontage”: Yes
• “being lit at night”: N/A