Burning Man supplies Silicon Valley with an ideal of non-commodified collaborative labor.

Evidence

Fred Turner argues that Burning Man provides a cultural infrastructure for new media labor, modeling commons-based peer production, gift economies, community participation, and the potential of “vocational ecstasy”: self-fulfillment through creative work and radical self-expression. Turner links the social structure of Burning Man to Google’s company culture, which emphasizes collaboration, a relatively flat corporate hierarchy, and the pursuit of individual passion projects through “20 percent time.” He maintains that for Bay Area technologists, Burning Man represents a week where the idealistic principles of new media production are brought to life, cementing the rich social networks that flexible labor models make necessary, and “work[ing] through the contradictions” of locating these ideals in a corporate setting. Burning Man demonstrates a commitment to the same values that Web 2.0 idealizes, and allows technologists to affirm the validity, importance, and presence of these ideals in their lives. Just as Burning Man is a blueprint for creating a community that runs on gifts, bartering, and volunteerism, the rhetoric of Web 2.0 suggests that technology as a business can embody the same values. — Alice E. Marwick, Status Update, 139

Categorization

• DEFINE: Defines ‘vocational ecstasy’ as self-fulfillment through creative work and radical self-expression, a core term for understanding creative-labor ideology.
• XREF: Connects to the gift-economy and peer-production debates foundational to digital-culture studies and to Marwick’s broader critique of how countercultural ideals get absorbed into corporate tech. — connects to: Burning Man is a physical counterpart to the open, collaborative Internet ethos — Alice E. Marwick, Status Update: Celebrity, Publicity,…, 138; Burning Man models the ideals and labor structures of tech culture — Alice E. Marwick, Status Update: Celebrity, Publicity,…, 139; Web 2.0 ideology fuses Silicon Valley capitalism with countercultural activism while embracing capitalism — Alice E. Marwick, Status Update: Celebrity, Publicity,…, 55

Broader Connections

• Burning Man models the ideals and labor structures of tech culture #corroborates (0.92) — Alice E. Marwick, Status Update, 139
• Web 2.0 ideology fuses Silicon Valley capitalism with countercultural activism while embracing capitalism #corroborates (0.75) — Alice E. Marwick, Status Update, 55