Radical Inclusion
Anyone may be a part of Burning Man. We welcome and respect the stranger. No prerequisites exist for participation in our community.

Gifting
Burning Man is devoted to acts of gift giving. The value of a gift is unconditional. Gifting does not contemplate a return or an exchange for something of equal value.

Decommodification
In order to preserve the spirit of gifting, our community seeks to create social environments that are unmediated by commercial sponsorships, transactions, or advertising. We stand ready to protect our culture from such exploitation. We resist the substitution of consumption for participatory experience.

Radical Self-reliance
Burning Man encourages the individual to discover, exercise and rely on his or her inner resources.

Radical Self-expression
Radical self-expression arises from the unique gifts of the individual. No one other than the individual or a collaborating group can determine its content. It is offered as a gift to others. In this spirit, the giver should respect the rights and liberties of the recipient.

Communal Effort
Our community values creative cooperation and collaboration. We strive to produce, promote and protect social networks, public spaces, works of art, and methods of communication that support such interaction.

Civic Responsibility
We value civil society. Community members who organize events should assume responsibility for public welfare and endeavor to communicate civic responsibilities to participants. They must also assume responsibility for conducting events in accordance with local, state and federal laws.

Leaving No Trace
Our community respects the environment. We are committed to leaving no physical trace of our activities wherever we gather. We clean up after ourselves and endeavor, whenever possible, to leave such places in a better state than when we found them.

Participation
Our community is committed to a radically participatory ethic. We believe that transformative change, whether in the individual or in society, can occur only through the medium of deeply personal participation. We achieve being through doing. Everyone is invited to work. Everyone is invited to play. We make the world real through actions that open the heart.

Immediacy
Immediate experience is, in many ways, the most important touchstone of value in our culture. We seek to overcome barriers that stand between us and a recognition of our inner selves, the reality of those around us, participation in society, and contact with a natural world exceeding human powers. No idea can substitute for this experience.

Because BURN2 is a mirror of a Real Life event, we voluntarily accept many of the same restrictions that nature imposes on the real thing, to see how creative we can be in a similar situation. We use the same blank landscape.

We pretend that we must bring everything we need in our car or in a truck. We don't build houses to live in, we build tents. If we don't drink enough water, we will die! Going to Burning Man takes great preparation. The Black Rock Desert is 40 square miles of dry, flat mud pancake ringed by distant mountains. There is nothing there. Not a bug, a blade of grass, a rock or a drop of water. Practicing "radical self reliance", 50,000 people each bring everything they need to survive for a week. Water, shade, storm shelter, food, clothing for hot days and cold nights.

Plus, if you can squeeze it in your car, you'd better bring your sequined cocktail dress, your propane canon, your generator, your couch, your latest sculpture, your two-storey nightclub shaped like a duck, your Santa Claus outfit, your... well, everything you need to entertain yourself and your neighbors for a week. At Burning Man, no entertainment is provided.

Nothing is for sale. You may not advertise business of any kind. You must clean up after yourself. The dust storms are terrifying. The altitude is high. The sun is relentless. The night can be freezing cold. If it rains, you will be stuck in the mud for days. At Burning Man, you will be overwhelmed by the scope of what you see.

You will confront your inner self. You will rely on strangers and become friends. You will be accepted at face value no matter who you claim to be. You will be engaged by community. You will interact with art that can kill you.

After more than 20 years, Burning Man has developed many traditions that we carry on at BURN2. The Greeters will orient you at the edge of the city. The residential flights of fancy known as Theme Camps welcome anyone who walks by to participate in an activity organized around a theme. Art Cars and Mutant Vehicles are rolling extravaganzas of creativity and transportation. Costume is outrageous. Nudity is accepted. Fire and explosions are common.

Art is interactive and built by large groups of volunteers. At at the end of the week, the Man is burned amidst a huge party. The last night, the Temple is burned with solemn reverence. Then everyone cleans up and goes back to their Default World, Leaving No Trace on the desert, of the city that was just there.

So, pretend that your car or truck is in the driveway waiting to be packed. You are going to BURN2. What will you bring? How will you build? Who will you be?

Welcome to the other side....

In 1986, Larry Harvey and Jerry James fashioned an 8-foot-tall human figure out of scrap wood, brought it to the beach and burned it. Spontaneously, a crowd formed to enjoy the spectacle. Larry and Jerry were both gratified by the attention it received, but more amazing was the creative response of the crowd. One stranger performed an act of kindness for the burning statue. Another made up a song about fire and played it on his guitar. A party began and strangers began to talk.

For the same reason people do Burning Man. To learn and grow. And to form a community that values creative learning and growing.

The temporal nature of it is vital to having immediate and unmediated experience, and the DIY aesthetic meshes perfectly with Second Life's riot of user-created content. When Philip Linden put the tools of creation into the hands of Residents, he set up the same level playing field that energizes Burning Man.

Everyone contributes. Nobody is special, and everyone is a star! So get involved. It doesn't even matter how much you know about Second Life.

If you are not a great builder-- this is the place to experiment and learn from others.

If you don't know anyone in Second Life yet, you will. If you are a veteran of Second Life and you crave a little good-old-fashioned creative chaos, come on out.

BURN2 will be exactly what each of us put into it.

In 1999, Philip Linden went to Burning Man, and came back with new ideas for the virtual world he was planning. Among them was the idea that humans abhor a blank canvas and will compulsively create form to fill void. They will provide their own content and entertainment and create a whole city (or world) when they are given permission and tools to do so.

Humans will naturally form community when physical and emotional conditions are harsh and they are wrenched out of their usual comfort zone. Humans are resourceful. The fewer the tools that are available, the more creative and amusing are their solutions to problems of food, shelter, transportation, art, leisure and identity.

What happens at the real life Burning Man is quite phenomenal. This real-world city of 50,000, built entirely by its citizens, is 100 miles from the nearest source of supplies. Yet it has roads, street signs, an FAA-approved airport, a power grid, a hospital, huge public plazas, street lights, processions, rituals and spectacles. It has fabulous fashions, ridiculous situations and artworks so raw they are literally dangerous.