The Good Stuff:
THE ART ROCKED! I was thoroughly impressed by the quality (and SIZE)
of art produced by the grantees this year. I love that 2/3 of the
grantees had never applied for a grant before. I think our $13.5k was
very well spent.
THE EFFIGY ROCKED! The community involvement in both creating the
pieces and preparing for the burn was an amazing thing to watch. The
decorating tent was busy all weekend. Those who succumbed to
Bobalicious-pressure and begrudgingly agreed to carry one armload of
firewood stayed for 30 minutes to help load all of it. People passing
by were asking where they could get a piece to decorate as we were
finalizing everything for the burn.
EMS and Rangers rocked! They were visible throughout the event and
seemed well-staffed, well-organized and able to respond to most
situations with ease, especially emergency ones.
Most attendees were equipped to handle the crappy weather. There were
those who weren't and those who left, but MOST of us managed to be
prepared, self-reliant, and participate in the rest of the event.
Improvements Needed:
Better define the role of the Art Grant Lead. Lots of people were
looking to me for answers to things I hadn't been involved in before
they asked. We figured most of it out, but improved communication
earlier in the process would ease the load on several other areas like
Placement and Sound.
Something's gotta give on the music situation. I've always been able
to sleep through ANYTHING, but apparently the sound camps this year
were beyond anything, because I didn't sleep much. And it wasn't
because Bobalicious was looking for some more nookie.
Can we remember that we are an art festival, not a music festival?
Music is certainly one form of art and a very important part of the
experience, but it doesn't give a few people the right to hold the
rest of us hostage for even an hour let alone 19 of them for 4 days in
a row. Sound needs to be confined to the general area of the sound
camp, bass included. Then everyone can enjoy the music they choose to
be near instead of being force-fed by whoever has the most powerful
system.
I'm very excited to see where we go from here! We've all helped to
create a kick-ass event, and with the participation of this amazing
team, it's just going to keep getting better.
~Miss Alicious
I had a good time at Apo. The real fun was the work weekend, but Apo
too was ok. I mean really who can beat Bacon Risotto? I mean that,
really, someone try and beat it because I would love to try something
better than that!!!
My good's at Apo:
The rain; it kept our population manageable.
Very simple gate entry, set up, parking, placement seemed to be really
on top of things... best I've every seen at a Colorado event!
Medical, Fire and Rangers; I heard a lot of stuff going on and
everything handled it fine. When dumbass was too stupid to get
outside help, you let dumbasses be dumbasses... I loaned clothing to
cold peeps and got it back, right-on!
Lee, (yes, you are your own category)... I loved seeing you at the
event! I wished we hung out more!
Community help building the Effigy; not only with the individual
pieces, but then those that came together to help load it with
firewood, we probably had 50 to 100 people help us move wood. That is
crazy good participation!
Sausage on a stick (AKA: Bob's morning wood): Fuck yeah, that worked
so well we may bring it back next year...
Radio Communication; when I needed to get a hold of someone on the
radio, and they were on comm, it worked and worked well.
Porta-potties were clean and I thought good. Except for getting
really annoyed when I went to town for 36 extra rolls of TP, just to
find out that they were never put in the bathrooms and are now in
storage.
Most importantly... no one getting too burned out. Tired, yes.
Exhausted, yes... but not too much. Great job sharing the load!
Need's work for next year:
Population limit: There needs to be a limit and it needs to be
announced. Next year we need to announce we sold out this year
(because our target was 1000, and we hit it) and everyone should plan
on buying their tickets ahead of the event. This will allow everyone
to manage the event better. We will have more people pre-buy tickets.
We can sell more tickets at the gate than our limit, but we have to
reserve the right to put a cap on it for safety sake (and health
reasons with porta-potties). The extra money is not worth the risk to
the event, event leaders or our participants! Seriously folks, if we
would have had 1500 people, we would have had a lot more issues and
then all the leads/board members end up taking on extra stress of
dealing with the extra people. And everyone would have ended up burnt
out. It is not worth it, as I overheard one wise woman say "we are
here to have fun too". Plus we need enough wrist bands to manage over
selling. We need a game plan to manage over selling with regard to
camping, parking, porta potties, infrastructure etc.
We can not have a $30K + cash after the event. I trust everyone that
dealt with cash, but that is just asking for too much of a problem.
Not from those that we trust with the money, but from someone else
that decides to take it by force. Seriously, that's enough money for
some to come in with a gun and take it! That is not a risk anyone
should be taking!!! Imagine if we had 500 more participants pay at
the gate (that would be over $65K cash on our hands) It's not worth
it! We need to focus on getting more pre-sales so we have less of a
liability at the gate.
Speaking of wrist bands: Board members should have a different wrist
band, and maybe ingition members or team leads. So when there is a
problem or dispute, there is no hearsay or quessing who is a board
member or a lead.
Music enforcement: Yes it needs to be done. Organic Sound camp was
the #1, #2 and #3 complaints on my book. They were supposedly a
non-amplified camp placed in a non-amplified music area. Then they
played some super, bad-ass, awesome instramental music, which was
great and what they were there for. Afterward, they put on some
bass-sucking overpower-their-subs music that destroyed everyone's
night who was anywhere from 30 to 130 feet of their camp. I
personally shut them off at 5 am after they didn't go to quiet hours
at 4 am. They didn't go to quiet hours because they weren't a
registered sound camp and didn't know the rules. Every theme camp/art
grant should probably be given a check box if they will have any
amplified music and if they check yes they go through the sound
routine, contract etc. If they check no, and show up with music
played louder than a generator, they get shut down...
I would love to see an esplanade like Burningman for sound camps.
Flipside (when I went), had a circle filled with all theme/sound
camps, and the Effigy burned right next to the circle. Everything
else was camping. That is why Bman and Flipside work so well. Not
everyone is there for the music to be played all night. I know
everyone wants there to be the opportunity for all night music. And
that works great at Flipside and Bman because they manage their music
and camping seperately. But Apo doesn't and that really sucks for the
majority of the participants at Apo. I walked around all the sound
camps on Sat morning and shut them down at 6. Organic had no one
dancing, a DJ and 1 other person in the dome, and two cuddilers on the
side. Timmy's camp had 6 people in the dome (and there was another
dozen + at Nate's art). Circus high, Camel Toe, and Hula were already
down or quiet enough to not be heard outside their camps. So Organic
you could hear everywhere on the upper area, and Timmy's on the lower
area. For the benefit of 2% of the population everyone at Apo had to
deal with those camps sound. We learned that this was a problem the
first Apo and every year we keep making waivers for this problem to
continue. If we have limited sound space, then fill it up first come
first serve. If someone comes late say we had X amount of space and
it filled up. That is what Buringman does. Then tell them who has
the space and have them contact that camp to see if they can play too.
We can't keep making exceptions for sound camps at the expense of
every other participant. I know we've lost Fela because there isn't
any place at Apo for a music free area. We are getting threats for
more people to leave; the people that make these events happen with
good theme camps, great art or other fantastic community experiences
other than music. And, if we do this, and it works, we may be able to
let the sound camps play even longer (thus making the 2% of the
population even happier). Please note: that doesn't mean place the
sound camps and have them put their speakers pointing toward the
camping areas! As with Burningman, you point them to the open
playa/woods, not toward the campers. Or just say fuck it and make Apo
a rave and at least we'll know what we are (or are not) signing up
for.
Bobalicious
hooray! my laptop survived! a full teardown, air out, and swapping in a cloned drive saved the day...
first, i thought medical and rangers kicked ass this year. really impressive, everyone did a great job. thank you everyone!
bitching to follow...
my homies hauled out 8 (eight) garbage bags left by our camp, and another bag and a half (1 1/2) of moop. this was just in a 100 foot radius from out camp! there was a metric shit ton of newbies this year (not burners, never been to apo, never been to anything like this). lots and lots of newbies, many old timers missing in action, so really big "growth" considering. i don't want to get into the natural/word of mouth growth vs. semi-blind marketing debate, but if this is how apogaea is going to grow, we need to get stronger and much stricter about greeting (leave no trace [trash, bottles, cig butts] most of all), and maybe think about adding a roving patrol to watch for and educate against moopers.
i know the weather really knocked people silly, but the amount of trash this year was disgusting.
i have a few more observations, and i will provide feedback in the format guy requested (thanks for getting on this so quickly, guy) but that was the biggest problem i saw - newbies and all the problems they drag with them.
and dubstep should be banned from apo, if not outlawed altogether.
karma, i think you have me confused with someone else. i didn't have
any camp this year, nor was i associated with any. i spent the
majority of my time doing shifts this year.
i'm just trying to point out what i saw and heard myself, what
feedback i got from MANY other people (from almost 7 hours of
de-greeting), and what other feedback has been given to me by people
that feel the future of the event is in jeopardy.
sorry i don't have any solutions for large sound, as i confessed. the
things you mentioned have been done all along, but with little to no
results. that's awesome you were one of the dozen i saw dancing. i am
glad you had a great time, but many others did not.
again, i love big sound too. that is a huge part my life, and has been
since way before burning man existed. but i am realizing how it
affects everyone else who are there for many other reasons. you and me
and a handful of other people don't mind the boomboomboom, but two
people told me the cupboards in their trailers were rattling all night
long. i brought a futon this year, because air mattresses amplify the
bass, but my teeth still rattled, i shit you not. sure, not sleeping
is another option, but when you have work to do, some sleep is nice. i
would have camped up top this year, but being gimped out, i thought it
would be better to camp centrally. look, i held your same "fuck your
day" position for a long, long time. but i see too many valuable
people leaving due to this, i've meet too many new good people that
say they are not coming back due to this, and an ever-growing influx
of the young kids that have no comprehension of what any of this is
about, yet are becoming the bulk of the population. again, i hauled
almost ten fucking bags of trash out of the area i camped in. not to
mention the fuckos selling bad drugs...
i'm not sure i'm coming back either. not sure like the direction, or
lack thereof, that apo seems to be taking. when working the gate on
thursday, and seeing cars backed up 30 deep all day and well into the
night, i got really concerned. of course, thursday was fucking
amazing, and seemed like saturday compared to last year. but when i
asked what we were expecting, one of the board members told me 1200,
with enough wristbands for 1400. i asked what the cap was, and was
told there wasn't one.
we hit our limit for HAR pretty much at 900 or so last year. that is
simply fucking downright irresponsible if we really were going to let
1400 people in the gate. there was no parking left. the staff, the
shitters, everything would have been overwhelmed. we parked over 40
cars outside the gate, and the sheriff and forest service gave us
three hours to get them all moved or they faced $125 dollar tickets
each. we did it, but that took a use of resources meant for other
things. i really think it was good fortune that over 200 people left
saturday due to the weather, or we all would have had a really hard
time. i completely agree with bob that we move to presale only, and
with a realistic cap, like every other burn does.
anyways, i have yet to submit my full report, but i hope to do that
very soon. i apologize for letting these issues sidetrack me.
ps to bob: sorry, but i didn't see your addy as one of the original
recipients, nor do i have any fucking idea who is on the ignition
list. all i know is ignition is where the After Action Report requests
are coming from, so sorry for bothering you.
--
bug.out
may our wisdom surpass our knowledge
Dubstep:
I'm not the biggest fan. I appreciate the merits of it as a dance
music style, but it got old very quickly as I heard the same sets
played over and over... It's the same reason why most of us hate
commercial radio - repetition in excess. That said, I respect and
support anyone's right to bring the music of their choice provided
that they abide by boundaries that are set to create a fair and
respectful environment to others. I agree with the points being made
about reigning in sound camps that overpower their neighbors, but I
WAS NOT THERE when these alleged battles of the bands took place.
Karma makes another good point - who among those pointing fingers at
Drop City and Space Camp actually bothered to talk to them as a polite
neighbor and point out that they were abusing the sound space? Not
me, so I cannot comment further. Clearly, sound marshaling is an open
issue and won't be solved by bickering back and forth today or this
week.
Diversity in music:
I did a de-greeter shift on Sunday at last year's Apo. Lee asked me
to ask the question: "if you were the king or queen of Apo, what
would you do differently?" The overwhelming response was "MORE
DIVERSITY IN MUSIC!" I communicated this early on, but perhaps so
early that it got lost as a point to prioritize in our efforts in
preparing for this year's Apo. However, this was a major motivation
that I had in mind when I volunteered to lead Centropolis (more on
this in detail later). The mission statement of Centropolis was to
create an open venue for performances and workshops, but emphasis was
on performances. We had a burlesque show, which was wildly
successful! I had also booked an acoustic folk rock band to play
Friday evening. This was cancelled because the lead singer didn't
make to Apo after all. There were also jam sessions tentatively
planned, but the storm threw everyone for a loop so many plans got
cancelled. Anyway, more on Centropolis in its own section below.
Inter-camp event coordination:
This is a good idea and needs to thoroughly explored, in my opinion.
Many people told me that they didnt want to schedule their Centropolis
events until they knew what else was going on. As we know, by this
time its usually too late, unless someone is just good at getting the
scoop. They either don't want a bigger show to draw away a crowd, or
they want to be respectful to their friends by not doing the same to
them. Whatever the intentions, I think its important that we
facilitate this for the community in some way. It will help create
synergy between camps and also promote a spirit of collaboration
rather than competition. My suggestion is to have a website that
works similar to the volunteer signup. Registered camps will have
their section (like each volunteering branch) and time slots as
columns. Events will be posted the way a volunteer's name is shown.
Clicking on the event name will show a brief summary and allow linking
to external pages such as a facebook event page. I think Bug is the
best person to comment more about logistics or the most effective and
LOW MAINTENANCE/OVERHEAD way to create this.
Everything else:
Kudos to all the teams on doing a great job with their respective
areas. No more to comment on this as everyone has already submitted
excellent comments and suggestions.
Centropolis:
What worked:
Our volunteers kicked ass. All of our most labor intensive efforts
were well staffed and executed in a timely manner.
The dome provided shelter that was well used (until the storm). I
walked by Thursday and Friday at various times there were people just
chilling in the shade. Our paper free-speech-board survived the rain,
as that part of the dome was also rainproof, and also it was hanging
on the leeward side of the vinyl. We should continue providing a
shelter (at least shade) that belongs to everyone, as some new people
I talked to are shy and feel awkward walking into someone's tent, even
if it is communal. After the storm, people had little spare time to
sit around and chill, plus the seating was wet.
I really think that the provisions that we managed to bring together
were sufficient to have seen more events if there was no storm on
Friday night.
What didn't work:
There weren't as many events as we had hoped to see. This can be seen
in two ways: a failure due to lack of marketing OR simply a lack of
need. Maybe we would have drawn a crowd if I hooked up my MP3 player
and started blasting Led Zeppelin at 2PM on Saturday. Maybe someone
else would have done this if they had known it was possible. Maybe we
would have gotten more events if there was a better recruitment effort
started much earlier. Or maybe Apo just didn't need yet another
performance space. This is debatable. What I can say with certainty
(especially since Caroline and others expressed this to me more than
once) is that this year's Center Camp was an experiment. At the time
that we should have been recruiting participation, we still didn't
know what we were going to do. And there isn't necessarily anything
wrong with that. It took this year's effort to build the model for
future Apos, and by the way, I WILL document details more thoroughly
for Ignition archives.
Sound system - I was the wrong person to work on this due to lack of
experience and equipment. (Many thanks to Cano for providing a sound
system, and to my brother Nic who knows how to hook it up and identify
missing cables) Once it was set up, I then lacked the bandwidth to
manage it. It could have been utilized much more. In the future, it
probably will be, now that so many are expressing their frustration
with the limited music diversity. There needs to be a volunteer
dedicated to managing the sound system during the event as well as
coordinating participants prior to the event. Managing the sound
system isn't something that can be left up to shift volunteers, as
they may lack the experience. There is also the issue of who takes
responsibility for expensive equipment being used for a communal
space. This was included in my scope of responsibility on top of
everything else, and it clearly should be a separate position.
Dome cover - another thing that slipped through the cracks because I
had too much to do. We had two wonderful volunteers, Jessica and
Ashleigh, who stepped up in a BIG way. The dome cover as it was would
not have been nearly as good if they weren't there to save the day.
They are happy to keep working on the so-dubbed "Dome of Perpetual
Adornment". One good way is if we find a place in Boulder to set up
the dome and keep it there, so that things can be added throughout the
year instead of scrambling last minute. Either that or purchase a 100
foot parachute like Milkman had suggested in the first place. I found
one online for $400, and didn't want to spend that much when there
were donations of parachutes coming in. Alas none of them worked out
well since they were all too small. Also I still keep hearing mixed
reviews on the quality of shelter that a parachute provides other than
the simply aesthetic value.
Originally I had a vision of a village (inspired by metropolis) of
various elements that all collaborate with each other. Perhaps this
was somewhat naive, having never volunteered at such a high level
before. In a way, this already happens because people step up to help
whenever someone needs help. In another way, it cannot happen because
everyone has too much to do as it is and there is no remaining
bandwidth to collaborate in a big way. The scope was changed to a
more practical implementation, which is the next point:
Scope - the basic scope of Centropolis should have stayed limited to
the communal performance and workshop space. The addition of an
ambitious team member introduced an almost theme-camp mentality that
should have been avoided. Somehow, before we knew it, the scope
ballooned to include a camping area, a communal kitchen for camp
participants, a major event (the Thursday night party), and other
elements that were planned but didn't happen. As much as I appreciate
Jethro's help and insight, this was the wrong approach. His governing
philosophy was don't do anything half-assed. Either go big or go
home. So we set about to go big, and the result was that all the new
work that this created stretched us way too thin and distracted us
from providing the core purpose of Center Camp, which was the
performance and workshop space. If there is to be a Center Camp in
the future, it should be limited to only what the dome and stage were
intended to provide: a communal performance and workshop space, that
also provides a shade structure and possibly a rain/wind shelter.
By the time the Thursday party came around, I was burned out and had
to disappear. Those of you who know the whole story completely
understand. And besides, how did this idea come about? Who invented
the notion that nothing would be going on Thursday evening except for
the Centropolis Whomped-Out Potluck? This goes to my earlier point
about better coordination between camps in scheduling major events.
It would have saved some of our volunteers much frustration if this
thing was thought out better. Our "resident expert" on party planning
was absent due to an obligatory shift at the gate. Upon my suggestion
that we limit the hours of this event in order to encourage people to
visit other camps, all responsibility for this event was thrust upon
me in the last minute without my consent. (For the record, I never
supported nor signed up to organize this event. I only went along
with it because I thought that it was covered by others. Also for the
record, I maintained repeatedly that Centropolis was intended to be a
DAYTIME VENUE) This left no organized leadership for this event to
the best of my knowledge, except for Jules who was also thrust into a
position of leadership without her knowledge or consent. Anyway,
thanks to Karma who did a good job of gathering a crowd, many people
did enjoy the Truck's Whomp. I also think the Whomp Truck should have
been asked to stop Whomping by around 2AM, at which time there wasn't
really anyone left dancing. I apologize to the people who were
deprived of sleep, but once again must point out that I never should
have been in the position to manage any of this. I also apologize if
some of my observations of Thursday night are hazy. Like I said, all
the stress of preparations had burned me out and I could only maintain
my own sanity by leaving.
I may have more to add in the future. To summarize on Centropolis, it
is a great concept and was well received as a concept to grow into.
Thanks to everyone for their positive feedback. We now have a better
idea of how to do this and it can go more smoothly and successfully if
we address the deficiencies identified this year. This is a community
project and its success will always depend on wide participation. A
small group of people cannot carry this by manufacturing events to
fill the schedule and working at it during the majority of Apogaea.
Peace out,
Aaron K. Scotch, MD
"I'm not a real doctor but they call me Dr. Scotch"
Experiences - As we all know, running DPW is not for the shy or lazy. DPW takes a lot of pre-event work as well as tons of work during the event pretty much every day. There were some areas where I excelled at and some areas I just plain dropped the ball. Here are a few that stand out in my mind:
Porta Potties - 30 felt like a perfect amount for the 1000-1200 people with daily servicing. That's a toilet for every 35-40 people. A full box of TP was not left at the front gate by the company. Only about 20 rolls which were used by nightfall. (Bob, sorry nobody told me that you made a TP run on Sat)
Storage load/unload - I went out of my way to recruit people to show up at the storage for truck load/un-load. About half of the people that I lined up didn't make it for one reason or another. Sorry about that Dave. Maybe you can assist with recruiting for this in the future? (so you don't get screwed)
Radio's - DPW having a radio is mandatory. It was essential to be in constant communication in order to get things done. I think that placement & parking (being that it was such an issue this event) should of been on com also, but a different channel. Many placement & parking issues sprung up and better communication would have helped greatly.
Golf Carts - Without Lee supping them up, they would have never lasted the end of the first day. They were not meant for high altitude, heavy dust or steep grades. Only for flatter terrain could these have worked well. As DPW, I pretty much was constantly using one of the carts Thurs & Friday during the daylight hours.
Volunteer gathering - To my amazement, I got the best volunteers by sending out a recruiting email to the APO list. The people I had never met before helped me the most.
Truck rental - Captain Ron was not only a huge help, but he also saved us several hundred dollars. Getting it stuck on Sunday was definitely a big problem. Every time I offered to interject, I was told that he was working with the ranch hands to pull him out. I checked on him several times through the day. When I was alerted that there was physical work being done by Ron, I immediately rounded up like 8 people and shovels & rakes. We went to help until he was freed. Sorry if I was slow to respond! By the time the truck was free, it was quite late. Thankfully because so many people were planning to stay Sunday night, I had plenty of hands to load the truck in the dark.
Wood - We had a surplus of wood due to weather, so it was great that we had a buy-back option. Having the wood piles placed in the correct locations worked great. Minimal wood theft still occurred in lower lot. Had several people asking if they could purchase wood on site. Maybe better communication to participants ahead of time about wood sales. Not just to theme camps.
Generators - Well... we tried. Bottom line is you get what you pay for. Generators that properly support our needs are not cheap. Of the three brand new generators we had, we had significant problems with all of them. The larger blue 4000w unit failed a couple of times. Each time it was able to be re-started after sitting for a while. The smaller 2000w units we had the most problems. One of them we had to totally open and clean out the carburetor. It seems that if they stop or stall with the gas valve in the ON position, the carburetor will flood with fuel preventing it from starting for quite some time. The second 2000w I was not able to get to start after it failed on Friday. I as well as other volunteers spent many hours of our time during the event addressing the problematic generators. This is not a good use of hard to get volunteers. Keep in mind this is brand new out of the box! As these generators get old, the problems will increase. It is my opinion that the stress & work load these generators put unnecessary on the volunteers is enough reason to purchase higher quality generators. Anything less & we are throwing away our money and time.
Now I get to bitch about everything else...
Centropolis - I still love the concept. We shouldn't get discouraged since it was only the first year. Once the momentum catches, it will be amazing social area. I did see that there were a lot of willing and interested volunteers. Some things that I think should be changed: I think it needs to be closer to the great circle. Remove the 'theme camp' aspect (no camping or kitchen) and increase the focus on design, decoration, workshops & performances. The lead should work further in advance to book the talent/workshops. This gives people ample time to put something together. I say year 2 we throw a little $$$ towards a proper water proof dome cover.
Med/Fire - Amazing team of leaders! They stepped up the game big time this year! More organization, more equipment and fully self sufficient. They even ran off of their own solar power (which saved our butts with poor generators)!
Info booth - This group was also very self sufficient in their set-up. It also seemed to be well ran and staffed.
Sound - APO had a sound policy (at HAR) of no more than 4 large sound camps. Why did we allow this to go over by almost double? Was there much conversation around this and did we do anything to compensate for this? It seems that our compensation was to spread them our all over APO. This seemed to piss off people that are used to camping in quieter areas. If we are tight on space, then maybe another option is to place them all next to each other and have them coordinate schedules of when they have their parties. Sleepy people may not have much sway with these loud DJ's, but other respected large sound camps may. Not playing well with the other sound camps will just minimize the amount of future sound camps, not participants! Even with more land, this may not be a bad idea. #2. I'm also going to suggest a minimal decibel level to be considered a sound camp. If you want to bring low level music for your camp during your 'special' party, no problem. These non sound camps can't go over that dB limit.
Music choice - This is a DO-ocracy. If you don't like how something is being done, do it better yourself! Don't like what the DJ's are playing? Co-organize a small sound camp! Can't find dj's to play your shitty music? Use a freaking IPOD! They are punctual and drama free!
Parking - Great job! It's not an easy one and is very demanding. I'm going to suggest that we get our volunteers trained up a little more ahead of time.
Volunteers - I have an idea for volunteer. Get them information about their jobs before the event. People sign up on the website. We collect their email addresses. I suggest that we send these volunteers a volunteer pack via email with they sign up for the shift. This package will include meet up information, things they need to bring with them to the shift, details about how to perform their job. Greeters being a perfect example. Many of us pretty much tell all virgins to do a greeters shift because they are so fun and easy. Why are these virgins being sent to the gate in the blind if we can help it? You know all of that info that the lead goes over with the volunteer at the beginning of the shift? Email all of that info to them! Then all you have to train is the ones that volunteer on-site (or have other volunteers train them). This information can be updated every year for each position (by that positions lead). It can be automatically send out (can ya do that Bug?) or we can have the volunteer lead manually send them out weekly. The key being that if a volunteer is better informed of what they are to do, then they will feel more comfortable and excited about doing it!
Cash Sales @ Gate - I think it is time to do away with this. We put tons of emphasis this year on buying the tickets pre-sale. The tiered pricing was both easily manageable as well as effective. What was it, 700 pre-sales? That is like 2/3 of the event. We usually get 1/2 via pre sale. If we did pre-sale only, we would still be guaranteed 800. If the party is closer to Denver the numbers will climb even higher. I think that doing pre-sales only will take away many headaches during the event: accepting, counting (at gate & post event), securing. There are complaints about entry taking too long, this would significantly speed it up. We could also mail them a waver with the tickets.
Board member identification - I like this. The radios usually work for identifying people in charge, but not all board members carry one all the time. How about an Elitist VIP Badge you wear around the neck? Easily seen. Great souvenir schwag. Can take it off when you are 'off duty'. Highly sought after!!!
Effigy - Great job at harnessing the community! The finished piece looked great. I would have so loved to have seen it go off without wet fuses.
You can expect more details in the overall safety and medical report,
but we were impacted by the failure of two of the three golf-carts. We
had to keep moving the response cart equipment (AED, oxygen, sat
phone) around to the working cart at the time. The carts were also
insufficiently powerful to serve as patient transport - we staged
Travis's personal vehicle near the medical tent to serve as patient
transport to the gate if necessary (which it was on Burn night). More
powerful vehicles that can handle the off-road event and HIGH altitude
would be important if there had been any serious safety issue.
Medical and Fire were powered from my personal solar trailer, instead
of generator power, which was a good thing. After the Centropolis and
Info Booth generators were unstartable after the rainstorm (at least,
I could not get either going, I'm not sure what their post-event
status is, or why they were not starting specifically) we would have
been without power at Medical without the solar, which would have made
that evening's incidents more difficult to handle, for sure.
Sound seems to need a separate discussion - there are a lot of good
points being made, and while I'm notoriously libertarian when it comes
to this sort of thing, I think it is clear it needs more thought.
Perhaps a big criteria needs to be added to the land search
considerations "Area for sound camps to be located such that they are
far enough from other camping, and able to be pointed in a harmless
direction". Also, we may want to get on the phone with Flipside's
sound policy lead - they've been through this sort of thing before,
and while it is never easy, they've managed to work out some creative
solutions to the inevitable conflicts that face all of the regional
events with regards to sound, and might have some valuable insight.-Sam
I hope everyone finds my notes and criticisms helpful as I don't intend any to be taken in a negative manner. Everyone was great!
I've summarized both my direct areas of control and all those I had the pleasure of working with, but first I'm listing my recommendation for improvement.
Issues:
Enforcement is not set up to deal with complaints, or even know about them. The scope is not really defined and is more defined by just the sound policy. There were different perceptions of what duties a sound enforcement person had.
Sound camps are placed in ways that sound overlaps, where large sound camps overpower lower powered sound camps, where camps that probably don't want loud sound near them are right next to loud sound (contact improv?), and pointing at residential camping areas in close proximity.
Although much of the information was shared online on a spreadsheet there was not sufficient communication between placement, sound coordination, and sound enforcement. The sound coordinator was not asked by placement for any input prior to work weekend. It is not clear if the information about each sound camp was used to affect where camps were placed. There was a difference of opinion about the general theory of sound camp placement between placement and others (Spreading loud sound out vs containing it to one area, etc)
Jesse, the sound coordinator, expressed that he didn't want to be the guy that told camps what they could and could not do, or something to that effect
Complaints of lack of variety of sound, too much dub-step
Recommendations:
Sound enforcement should be combined with sound coordination and should include authority over the placement of all sound camps, direction of sound before work weekend, enforcement of sound policy, and the ability to deal with complaints
Volunteers may be needed to patrol for violations and enforce the rules
Whoever is enforcing the sound should be on radio so that they may be aware of complaints or rangers / those on radio should know how to reach them
The sound enforcement / sound coordinator lead needs to be able to interact positively with the sound camps and be ok with being the "bad guy"
Encourage silent sound camps (can we encourage an art grant for a dj setup that transmits wireless to people with headphones / like a small fm radio station)
Ask the community for ways to encourage musical diversity
Find a way to measure / limit bass at long distances from the source?
Provide each sound camp with a little sound policy note and maybe a clock that can be attached to the dj booth
Issues:
Not everything we wanted to photograph was photographed (art installations, etc)
Recommendations:
Bigger photo team or less involved photographers
Issues:
Didn't get many responses due to weather, apparent survey length, etc
People don't want to fill out surveys when they are not all there
Very few responses from areas outside of Denver / Boulder
Recommendations:
Concentrate on easier survey and probably just electronic
Location - ask for advisors regions as opposed to cities - or both
Regional Advisors and representatives need to get their constituents to participate so that they are represented
Issues:
When weather issues caused people to go to the medical tent there weren't enough blankets for them.
Some people had their tents soaked, washed out, and didn't have any dry clothes or sleeping arrangements. Lots of people left due to this issue, which may not be a bad thing.
Recommendations:
Get blankets for the medical tent
Come up with a disaster plan, although this could be considered self reliance. Still, it would be nice if we could have backed up places where people could safely sleep and perhaps think of a way that people could dry their clothes / sleeping bags in the event of water damage.
Coordination issues with other departments
Trouble counting the ticket sales
Didn't know when the truck had to leave, but when this was clarified we loaded out quickly. Also didn't know when unload was.
The truck got stuck and no volunteers helped for 7-8 hours. I dug for an hour to some effect, and then when volunteers arrived the work was done quickly. Communications issue to DPW.
Lots of tents and camps didn't know they had to leave, but this appears to have been corrected when it was apparent. Can did an excellent job of informing people when it was time to go.
A number of people apparently can't make it into the hole in the portapotties, not sure what to do about that, but Friday night was a mess from more than just the weather. It seemed that even with the massive increase in portapotties it was still difficult to find a clean one sometimes.
After people went off radio it was difficult to communicate, suggest switching to FRS radios after the big radios leave.
Buy a new megaphone
No idea what was going on there as it appeared to mostly have not been setup as planned, although there apparently were some nice events on the main stage that I missed
The whomp truck seemed to do a good job on Thursday
The generators didn't work so well?
Sound policy was set through a combination of actions at the board retreat, community interaction at town hall meetings, an ignition vote on the policy, and final a board vote. The policy was written in several places including the survival guide, the survival guide update, and the theme / sound camp application. Theme camps and artists had to agree to the policy in their applications, although the exact provisions of the policy changed during the application process so that some camps may have agreed to different versions of the policy. This did not appear to cause any issues though. Each camp also had to provide 2 contacts that would be dealt with should issues arise. I did bring an electronic copy of this list but forgot to print one for the event. This also didn't appear to cause any issues.
At the event most sound camps were aware of the policy. There was one camp that wasn't technically registered as sound camp but that did have an art grant to provide sound that was unaware, even though they had agreed to the policy in their art grant form. This camp, Organix, attempted to complete a sound camp form after the deadline but wasn't able to figure it out and also didn't get me any information about what kind of amplified sound they would have despite my requests. This put them in a grey area but I treated them as a sound camp and went over the policy with them after a complaint. Bobalicious requested that they not have any amplified sound since they weren't registered as a sound camp but I didn't feel that it was my place to tell them that as that was more of a sound camp application and sound coordination issue. I did get reassurance from them that they would be considerate of all requests and would cooperate and honor sound policies. Afterwards I did hear that they deviated from their normal jam sessions with only some amplified sound and played dub-step until late at night, but in my patrols did not come across it. I'm not aware if anything they did violated the sound policy exactly, but if I was aware that they were dj'ing instead of just playing the music described in their art grant I would have talked to them about it as there were complaints. Incidentally, this camp also didn't know they were supposed to leave on Sunday by dusk and I ended up telling them that they needed to do so. This camp was originally placed at the bottom of the hill and Space Camp was supposed to be here. After collaborating with Jesse the sound coordinator and HollyG they switched them. I'm sure Bobalicious would have been much more upset if Space Camp was in this space rather than Organix. Also, Bobalicious asked me to tell them to reconfigure their subwoofer because it sounded bad but I didn't think that was something I could really order them to do.
I did personally have to tell a number of camps to turn their music down, off, or make adjustments:
Metal Alchemy @ Drop City - On Thursday night I noticed that they had their speakers pointing the wrong direction than as they were advised by the sound coordinator. After inquiring and meeting with resistance I told them they had to move it or they would be shut down. Timmy of Drop City informed me that they would move it on Friday. After several more talks involving Jesse the sound coordinator, Holly, Uncle Dave, and others and with the addition of Jeff of Bass Couch and his ridiculous equipment they figured out a new speaker placement that conformed with how we wanted them pointed. Timmy invited me to check their sound with a decibel meter, which I did, and I didn't have any more interaction with that camp regarding issues. Late on Sunday I was informed that there had been complaints regarding this camp that were dealt with Rangers. I was also told that Jeff dealt with the issues eventually and suggested that the quiet hours actually started later than they should because people should be able to sleep before going home due to safety concerns, which I fully agree with. I am not aware of all the details but I understand that there were complaints from some people about them playing too late or too loud. I am not aware if they were playing loud enough for it to have been considered a sound policy violation, so I'm not sure if I could have done anything to improve the situation had I been informed about it in time. The rangers got them to agree to turn off at 6am instead of 8am in order to ease complaints. I did go by at 6am on my regular patrols and they were playing although very quietly and certainly abiding to sound policy rules. Note that I never dealt with the people that were listed as contacts on the them camp application as they apparently weren't decision makers.
Space Camp was a big concern of mine since according to the information that I gathered from each camp before the event they had the most powerful system at 10,000 watts. This turned out to not be the case because Metal Alchemy got more sound, TWRG had more efficient speakers and amplifiers that made their sound louder than it was listed (although they also said they had 2000 watts less than they did, and also some their system didn't make it. They still were quite loud and their bass carried quite clearly all the way to the gate when their system was at normal volume. They obeyed all rules as far as I know except on Sunday, when I went down there at 6am and found them to be playing at normal volume. I told the dj's to turn it down and keep it down to 90db which I set for them (1/2 half what they were playing at) and told them to keep it that low until 8am when quiet hours started. I was unaware if they made some other agreement with the rangers as I didn't hear about that later, but I am unaware of further complaints.
TWRG / The Wild Roofie Gang is run by Milk who was quite aware of all the sound policies, however on Saturday morning at 5am they were playing above normal volume (110db on the dance floor) and I didn't see Milk. I was on ranger dutie so instead of telling them to do anything I informed them that the reduced sound hours were in effect and that they were playing at 110db. They turned it down and I am unaware of further issues. Incidentally 110db can cause permanent hearing damage after somewhere between 2 and 30 minutes exposure.
Circus High was placed across the street from a residential area where I was camped. They informed sound coordination that their sound was circular and wouldn't cause issues, however their main sound projected straight out across the street into the camping area. On Thursday night after playing at a comfortable volume for most of the night they increased their levels at midnight until some time around reduced sound hours. Although not violating any rules this caused the ground to shake enough that there were reports from campers, myself included, that the sound and vibrations were very loud could be felt more when one laid down on the ground, making sleeping difficult. I think there was some kind of issue with their bass carrying in the ground, possible reflecting off of rocks, but I'm not sure. Also, sound levels in tents was relatively high and could be enough to cause hearing damage (70-85db). On Friday I spoke with Earth and informed him of my safety concerns and other issues and asked if he could look into to rearranging the speakers and working with Jesse to alleviate the situation. He didn't change anything. On Saturday morning Earth started playing loud sound at or before 10:30am, well before quiet hours ended. I was woken up by this and rather irritable from lack of sleep and rushed over there to order him to turn it off until quiet hours. I was probably blunt and rude, but was shocked that Earth would cause any such problems. He turned off the music but started yelling at me from up on their scissor lift. I turned off their generator and argued with him briefly before returning to my camp. They kept the sound off until 11am but Earth yelled and raised his scissor lift all the way up to be able to yell more I suppose. Earth also told me to get out of his camp. Lee then used his megaphone to yell something about crappy electronic music but was apparently unaware that I had just yelled at Earth about the violation. Later that night Earth apologized to me about the confrontation and I apoligized to him about being in a bad mood. It appears that they were confused about when quiet hours ended and I don't know what was up with Earth at the time.
I was informed by Duny Dan regarding the issues on Sunday morning that the board was making rules that there weren't people to enforce, although I am unaware if any of the problems he was referring to were actually violations of the sound policy or just complaints about situations that were not violations. Overall I think most camps and dj's respected the policies and were cooperative, although with these issues and the apparent confusion with rangers I find that the sound enforcement as carried out was unsatisfactory.
Many forms were distributed along the road but there was no evidence that any of these were turned in. Boxes were at center camp, info booth, gate, and greeners (Thank you Karma). Most forms were destroyed in the rain / hail storm and all lower location distribution appeared to have ceased at that point. Will have to put out an electronic version. Several responses were gathered by the gate upon exodus, but not very many and only during a limited time on Sunday.
Apparently people also thought the 10 question form was too long. I think if it were mostly quantitative (just choose 1-5 to rate each question) with 1 or 2 comment areas then this would not be the case.
Fail, although I will attempt to correct this by sending out an electronic version soon.
Lots of things were shut down due to rain and weren't photographed. Both me and the other photographer were over-committed and unable to get everything.
Fail, although we both got some good stuff and I can probably find photos of all the art works and such in others collections.
Info Booth:
DPW did an incredible job setting up the Info Booth! Thanks, guys!
Info Booth kinda rolled along all on its own. Great volunteers from last year. I would suggest an earlier opening time (10:00?) and, if possible, a volunteer schedule staggered from the gate shift schedule, so if the Info Booth Lead also has to work gate, he/she can still be at Info for shift changes (example: 10:00 a.m. to 1:00 p.m.; 1:00 to 4:00, etc.). Two leads would be good just so that one person doesn’t have to be there every three hours during the four days of the event.
Simpler is better. Last year there was a ton of information that tried to be communicated to Info Booth volunteers each shift change (volunteer sign-ups, volunteer check-ins, radio protocol, swag give-outs, ice sales, etc.) every shift. This year it was lots easier.
If we’re just doing Info Booth during daylight hours, we don’t need to rig up all the lights. If we stay open past 8:30 p.m., though, we should have them.
I did have to use two of my own extension cords to get from the Info Booth to the central Apo genny, so we might want to invest in one 100’ cord for Info.
We should get at least a couple more waterproof tubs—the stuff in one Info Booth tub stayed dry; stuff in the cardboard boxes (WWWWs, maps, etc.) got soaked. At least one dedicated Lost and Found tub rather than using one that’s also used for something else.
Another good thing for Info Booth: battery/solar powered LEDs lighting up some information that people might want at night, when volunteers aren’t there: map, WWWW, emergency information, etc..
Wish list: Someone to build a mobile (as in, we can pack it into the truck to bring back to the storage unit), free-standing whiteboard frame. That is, a wooden or metal frame we can hang at least the large whiteboard from, so the whiteboard is at eye level. Also should have a little cover over the front, to keep rain from washing away notes. Benefit: the board is higher and thus easier to read, and easier to write on. It’s not leaned up against the Info Booth’s legs, which always looks ghetto. A little roof (2’ wide?) the length of the board would keep rain from washing away any writing on the board. LEDs/solar lights along the top would allow notes to be read at night.
Beyond Info
Yay to the lower prices up until Friday noon! I think that’s what brought people in on Thursday. Couldn’t believe how many people were there and camps were all set up and running Thursday night! “Thursday is the new Friday.” --Ronica
Yay to the Apogaea car stickers (especially the oval Apo logo ones). I like that we’re “branding” ourselves as our own thing, rather than in relation to BM. Car-sized stickers, rather than water-bottle-sized ones, are great because they’ll be more publicly visible.
Patches looked awesome! Thanks for using that design. Maybe if we wanted to use the same design in the future, we do a different color to signify a different year.
Unca Dave knows this already, but a whiteboard/bulletin board up at Gate/Greeters (like at Info Booth) would allow campers to leave location notes with their friends. Maybe combine it with a laminated map, so they could be like, “WE R HERE.”
We should get the large-sized (preferably laminated) site maps again; one for Info Booth and one for Greeters. Maybe a third for people to leave location notes on.
It went as well as it cuold have with what I had. Many random un-signed up people came by to help here and there. Got set up well, the education was nto as rain proof as I could have made it, the ranch was very helpful...did you see the cool receptacles they made me?, many vurgins had not heard of MOOP didn't know about recycling at apo or greening in general...I had my green team do what they could to educate as driving in and during green events but it is hard and think just needs more sttention at gate and greeters...if I had more help could have sent 2 people up there / shift to help educate on greening on the way in and if I had more help could have had full MOOP guardinas on Sunday when all the dumping occured. I had extra dry bags people could have had so their car wouln't have gotten so messy too. More sigsn would always help. I think the time things is a very hard concept to follow at apo or on playa...especially with no sun to help. I think help occurs the easiest when you say I need help right fucking now...or this is going on right fucking now come please! do yall agree.
We need a bigger storage unit, we have to be able to store all the education and greening stuff, all the new medical things and centropolis and it should be something we can access to dry out now...or we will have a big mess on our hands next year, it is something that should be also easy to access so if someone want s to do a fundrasier and use something for apo it could easily be pulled and returned by the right person. If you say had green education in general and then specific to apo and BM every party how much more effective would that be.
Why was captain ron digging hiself out for hours for the truck load? Said it was him and guy for hours? Thats not cool. I thought it was all taken care of or would have rallied people for him and DPW if needed. Also maybe to help the denver truck load and unload there can be peoople scheduled to be there and help quatermaster dave in the future so it goes smoother. I think thats is the case for many things...people say ohh sure I'lll be there to help and then honestly forget or just figure ahhh it's not a big deal someone else that has more time can do it.
Thanks and that's it for now from the long winded former green goddess....someone else needs to lead for next year (I will help the transition).
Peace out karma"krunck"ilicous...timmy deemed casue I was krunckin to it all no matter what was palyin!!!
Although we anticipated growth at Apogaea this year, we could not
necessarily anticipate or accommodate all the practical problems that
accompany that growth. Here are some examples of problems we handled
well: we had enough port-a-potties and they were kept clean; a lot of
emergency and non-emergent medical issues were met with a squadron of
competent personnel, who also got to have a fun time because there
were enough of us to share the burden; the art grant projects were
amazing and well-done; the communigy got lit, despite being saturated
with water for 24 hours.
Bug's point about speaker placement and wattage is a good place to
start. John's point about deliberately choosing different types of
sound is also excellent and spot on. There is nothing wrong with
dub-step/electp/techno, but even I was getting bored after days of it.
I only found Organic Sound Dome on the last night, during a routine
medical sweep. I was so overcome with hearing something non-techno,
non-dub (which I do like, btw) that I just stood there grinning like a
dumbass for ten minutes until I realized I was still on duty and had
to wander away again. Sound enforcement, which I initially thought
was a stupid idea, may not be after all. certainly if we move to new
land, there may be very exact limits on the amount of sound we can
produce (Flipside had to move from their land to a new site for this
very reason). We may all have gripes over the way parts of the event
went, but the event is over for another year and pointing fingers at
different camps as the source of the problem is counter-productive.
Offer up some possible solutions to the problems, so we can work on
practical implementation for next year.
-b
Dubstep:
I'm not the biggest fan. I appreciate the merits of it as a dance
music style, but it got old very quickly as I heard the same sets
played over and over... It's the same reason why most of us hate
commercial radio - repetition in excess. That said, I respect and
support anyone's right to bring the music of their choice provided
that they abide by boundaries that are set to create a fair and
respectful environment to others. I agree with the points being made
about reigning in sound camps that overpower their neighbors, but I
WAS NOT THERE when these alleged battles of the bands took place.
Karma makes another good point - who among those pointing fingers at
Drop City and Space Camp actually bothered to talk to them as a polite
neighbor and point out that they were abusing the sound space? Not
me, so I cannot comment further. Clearly, sound marshaling is an open
issue and won't be solved by bickering back and forth today or this
week.
Diversity in music:
I did a de-greeter shift on Sunday at last year's Apo. Lee asked me
to ask the question: "if you were the king or queen of Apo, what
would you do differently?" The overwhelming response was "MORE
DIVERSITY IN MUSIC!" I communicated this early on, but perhaps so
early that it got lost as a point to prioritize in our efforts in
preparing for this year's Apo. However, this was a major motivation
that I had in mind when I volunteered to lead Centropolis (more on
this in detail later). The mission statement of Centropolis was to
create an open venue for performances and workshops, but emphasis was
on performances. We had a burlesque show, which was wildly
successful! I had also booked an acoustic folk rock band to play
Friday evening. This was cancelled because the lead singer didn't
make to Apo after all. There were also jam sessions tentatively
planned, but the storm threw everyone for a loop so many plans got
cancelled. Anyway, more on Centropolis in its own section below.
Inter-camp event coordination:
This is a good idea and needs to thoroughly explored, in my opinion.
Many people told me that they didnt want to schedule their Centropolis
events until they knew what else was going on. As we know, by this
time its usually too late, unless someone is just good at getting the
scoop. They either don't want a bigger show to draw away a crowd, or
they want to be respectful to their friends by not doing the same to
them. Whatever the intentions, I think its important that we
facilitate this for the community in some way. It will help create
synergy between camps and also promote a spirit of collaboration
rather than competition. My suggestion is to have a website that
works similar to the volunteer signup. Registered camps will have
their section (like each volunteering branch) and time slots as
columns. Events will be posted the way a volunteer's name is shown.
Clicking on the event name will show a brief summary and allow linking
to external pages such as a facebook event page. I think Bug is the
best person to comment more about logistics or the most effective and
LOW MAINTENANCE/OVERHEAD way to create this.
Everything else:
Kudos to all the teams on doing a great job with their respective
areas. No more to comment on this as everyone has already submitted
excellent comments and suggestions.
Centropolis:
What worked:
Our volunteers kicked ass. All of our most labor intensive efforts
were well staffed and executed in a timely manner.
The dome provided shelter that was well used (until the storm). I
walked by Thursday and Friday at various times there were people just
chilling in the shade. Our paper free-speech-board survived the rain,
as that part of the dome was also rainproof, and also it was hanging
on the leeward side of the vinyl. We should continue providing a
shelter (at least shade) that belongs to everyone, as some new people
I talked to are shy and feel awkward walking into someone's tent, even
if it is communal. After the storm, people had little spare time to
sit around and chill, plus the seating was wet.
I really think that the provisions that we managed to bring together
were sufficient to have seen more events if there was no storm on
Friday night.
What didn't work:
There weren't as many events as we had hoped to see. This can be seen
in two ways: a failure due to lack of marketing OR simply a lack of
need. Maybe we would have drawn a crowd if I hooked up my MP3 player
and started blasting Led Zeppelin at 2PM on Saturday. Maybe someone
else would have done this if they had known it was possible. Maybe we
would have gotten more events if there was a better recruitment effort
started much earlier. Or maybe Apo just didn't need yet another
performance space. This is debatable. What I can say with certainty
(especially since Caroline and others expressed this to me more than
once) is that this year's Center Camp was an experiment. At the time
that we should have been recruiting participation, we still didn't
know what we were going to do. And there isn't necessarily anything
wrong with that. It took this year's effort to build the model for
future Apos, and by the way, I WILL document details more thoroughly
for Ignition archives.
Sound system - I was the wrong person to work on this due to lack of
experience and equipment. (Many thanks to Cano for providing a sound
system, and to my brother Nic who knows how to hook it up and identify
missing cables) Once it was set up, I then lacked the bandwidth to
manage it. It could have been utilized much more. In the future, it
probably will be, now that so many are expressing their frustration
with the limited music diversity. There needs to be a volunteer
dedicated to managing the sound system during the event as well as
coordinating participants prior to the event. Managing the sound
system isn't something that can be left up to shift volunteers, as
they may lack the experience. There is also the issue of who takes
responsibility for expensive equipment being used for a communal
space. This was included in my scope of responsibility on top of
everything else, and it clearly should be a separate position.
Dome cover - another thing that slipped through the cracks because I
had too much to do. We had two wonderful volunteers, Jessica and
Ashleigh, who stepped up in a BIG way. The dome cover as it was would
not have been nearly as good if they weren't there to save the day.
They are happy to keep working on the so-dubbed "Dome of Perpetual
Adornment". One good way is if we find a place in Boulder to set up
the dome and keep it there, so that things can be added throughout the
year instead of scrambling last minute. Either that or purchase a 100
foot parachute like Milkman had suggested in the first place. I found
one online for $400, and didn't want to spend that much when there
were donations of parachutes coming in. Alas none of them worked out
well since they were all too small. Also I still keep hearing mixed
reviews on the quality of shelter that a parachute provides other than
the simply aesthetic value.
Originally I had a vision of a village (inspired by metropolis) of
various elements that all collaborate with each other. Perhaps this
was somewhat naive, having never volunteered at such a high level
before. In a way, this already happens because people step up to help
whenever someone needs help. In another way, it cannot happen because
everyone has too much to do as it is and there is no remaining
bandwidth to collaborate in a big way. The scope was changed to a
more practical implementation, which is the next point:
Scope - the basic scope of Centropolis should have stayed limited to
the communal performance and workshop space. The addition of an
ambitious team member introduced an almost theme-camp mentality that
should have been avoided. Somehow, before we knew it, the scope
ballooned to include a camping area, a communal kitchen for camp
participants, a major event (the Thursday night party), and other
elements that were planned but didn't happen. As much as I appreciate
Jethro's help and insight, this was the wrong approach. His governing
philosophy was don't do anything half-assed. Either go big or go
home. So we set about to go big, and the result was that all the new
work that this created stretched us way too thin and distracted us
from providing the core purpose of Center Camp, which was the
performance and workshop space. If there is to be a Center Camp in
the future, it should be limited to only what the dome and stage were
intended to provide: a communal performance and workshop space, that
also provides a shade structure and possibly a rain/wind shelter.
By the time the Thursday party came around, I was burned out and had
to disappear. Those of you who know the whole story completely
understand. And besides, how did this idea come about? Who invented
the notion that nothing would be going on Thursday evening except for
the Centropolis Whomped-Out Potluck? This goes to my earlier point
about better coordination between camps in scheduling major events.
It would have saved some of our volunteers much frustration if this
thing was thought out better. Our "resident expert" on party planning
was absent due to an obligatory shift at the gate. Upon my suggestion
that we limit the hours of this event in order to encourage people to
visit other camps, all responsibility for this event was thrust upon
me in the last minute without my consent. (For the record, I never
supported nor signed up to organize this event. I only went along
with it because I thought that it was covered by others. Also for the
record, I maintained repeatedly that Centropolis was intended to be a
DAYTIME VENUE) This left no organized leadership for this event to
the best of my knowledge, except for Jules who was also thrust into a
position of leadership without her knowledge or consent. Anyway,
thanks to Karma who did a good job of gathering a crowd, many people
did enjoy the Truck's Whomp. I also think the Whomp Truck should have
been asked to stop Whomping by around 2AM, at which time there wasn't
really anyone left dancing. I apologize to the people who were
deprived of sleep, but once again must point out that I never should
have been in the position to manage any of this. I also apologize if
some of my observations of Thursday night are hazy. Like I said, all
the stress of preparations had burned me out and I could only maintain
my own sanity by leaving.
I may have more to add in the future. To summarize on Centropolis, it
is a great concept and was well received as a concept to grow into.
Thanks to everyone for their positive feedback. We now have a better
idea of how to do this and it can go more smoothly and successfully if
we address the deficiencies identified this year. This is a community
project and its success will always depend on wide participation. A
small group of people cannot carry this by manufacturing events to
fill the schedule and working at it during the majority of Apogaea.
Peace out,
Aaron K. Scotch, MD
"I'm not a real doctor but they call me Dr. Scotch"
Here is mine…
EMS/Fire – thanks to Cyn and Sam for throwing down big time. Stepped
up the game from years past. Nice to be able to step back and have
fun at the event. Professionalism increase significantly
Radios – good usage, no bleed over into EMS/Fire channel. All
equipment found and returned!
Golf carts. Blew low flying caribou. Not suited for off road / odd
terrain usage. POV’s were used for carrying patients (which worked).
Perhaps rent real trucks (cheaper than a gator) for the event.
Fire Specific – Dutch was on site, per contractual agreement with
ranch due to fire truck not functioning. Per dutch – so land owners
stepped up and took responsibility (believe they had to hire dutch to
be on site)
Music dispute. It is gonna happen. Come find me I will give you an
ambien(t) next time. No exclusion of music, better management (they
were blasting upwind of other’s music…but camps should work that out
amongst them selves) of sound, incuding enforcement of decibels and
hours (if the hours or decibels were an issue)
Centropolis – awesome. Nice to have a center camp area.
Parking was excellent – need to have contingency when lower lot fills
up so we aren’t causing problems on NFS land.
LEO (law enforcement) no interactions except for parking issues –
seemed pleased with the event
1. Apo Board and volunteers pretty much rocked. The population and weather
presented severe challenges and I think in general everyone pulled it off.
2. Dub-Step (and more precisely, the obnoxious volumes at which its
adherents insist on playing it) has to change. I've had numerous
conversations at and after Apo with long-time Burners who are considering
skipping Apo next year unless there is some limits imposed on the
non-Burner bullies who breeze into Apo every year, set up a lame dome or
two, and then play shit no one can dance to or chill out to at excessively
loud volumes. I don't have to like that "music" but it radically excludes
other interaction due to the excessive volume of the bass. If Space Camp
and Drop City return next year at the same cock-measuring contest volumes,
I will not attend. I know of about 12 veteran Burners who feel the same way
3. Greeters can only inform about MOOP and LNT, they cannot change a
person's character. A 21 year old raver inclined to throw their Sprite
bottle in the porta-potty is not likely to be dissuaded just because some
40-something at the gate tells them its a no-no and that Apo will get fined
by the vendor.
Greeters Highs and Lows:
1. Too many no-show volunteers. On one particularly busy shift on
Friday, 5 out of 6 volunteers did not show.
2. An alarming number of folks we greeted had never been to any
Burning Man event and had no clue what it was all about. I did not
feel we were getting through to the 20-somethings and the folks who
just wanted to get the hell out of their cars and set up camp.
3. After working fairly hard Thursday and Friday, I completly
crapped out on Saturday and owe everyone a big apology. I should be
spanked with bacon.
4. Either we need to have a volunteer orientation session
pre-event, or have another co-lead or two. Between building and
helping to run a theme camp and having to be at the Greeter station
several times a day for shift-change, I just got burned out,
particularly with no sleep. Pre-event orientation sessions could
dispense with the need to have a lead present at every shift change.
However, this may not work with the schwag-card system.
5. Greeter station needs to be physically more remote from the
gate. At peak times cars would back up from the gate to Greeters.
6. Perhaps Greeters are tasked with too much responsibility in the
information department. Mabye it is a little late in the game to go
over the 10 principles of Burning Man, all the Apo specific rules at
the Greeter Station, fliers from earth guardians and questionnaires.
Perhaps do this at the gate or info booth and let the Greeter station
be more like Burning Man greeters--a simple "welcome home" at a
specific place where the temporary autonomous zone begins.
7. Greeter station sould become more visible, perhaps with flags or
some cool art installation to make this stop for participants more
"fun."
8. While I was pleased to have help from experienced Burners, one
such person (in charge of Greeters at the regional based in Missouri)
was arguably rude in her approach. While she meant well with her
paddle-inflected "pop quiz" on the 10 Principles, she did cross the
line a bit. She definitely thought that the Missouri way was better
than our way of doing things. Again, some pre-event orientation,
perhaps even by e-mail, would get everyone on the same page. The
pre-printed cheat sheets prepared by Caroline were extraordinarily
helpful, though I think maybe Gate staff could be increased to cover
some of this stuff while people are getting their wrist bands. Or
not. I know they are busy as hell.
9. It was extraordinarily difficult to coordinate pre-event with my
co-lead, ostensibly due to a spam filter. Also, volunteers who sign
up for shifts must give phone numbers and e-mail addresses so they can
be contacted and orientated pre-event.
10. We need to get on the same page regarding our schtick. Do we
tatoo foks on their asses, arms, or not at all. I liked the branding
iron Huston made in 2008 and think we should re-implement that (with
appropriate ink) in the future.
11. The car port and lights were very welcomed.
12. Making people stop three times (gate, greeters, Info booth.)
may be a bit excessive.
13. Almost impossible to get folks to sign up for shifts on
Saturday evening.
Mylar blankets all the way. Very resistant to micturition (an issue with our other blankets, they really held the MASH tent together), easy/convenient to store and re-use, and fairly cheap.