EP 19 Athena Demos

Meet Athena Demos, who discusses the evolution of BRCVR, a social virtual reality platform now known as Burner Sphere. Demos details her transition from a long-term Burning Man regional organizer in Los Angeles to a pioneer of digital communal efforts born out of the 2020 pandemic BRC cancellations. She emphasizes that while physical structures may be absent, the Ten Principles—specifically communal effort and radical inclusion—remain the core "social capital" that sustains the global community. Ultimately, the project aims to serve as an immersive information superhighway, allowing users to build art, plan camps, and maintain year-round cultural connections in a persistent 3D metaverse.

https://burnersphere.com/

Transcript

They make the trek out to Burning Man for a week and a day. After a lot of work, oh, there's a lot of play. Party party drama drama drama. b****, b****, b****. Year after year, they come back to scratch that itch. They all say their lives have been changed. After many years, lives have have been rearranged. That changes what this show is all about. You'll see the impact of Burning Man up and out. So sit back, relax, and cancel all your plans. These are the stories about the shadow of the man. 

Hello and welcome to the Shadow of the Man Show. I am your host, Andy. Is this real? It's that Andy. Today our guest is Athena Demos. Welcome.

Thank you. Thanks Andy. It's great to be here with you.

Yeah. So for people who don't know, so what's your quick bio? So you were one of the longstanding like LA regional contacts, right? Uh you're is it is it BRC VR that which is your pro your your project? So what is your role and position in? That is

short bio. I don't have a short bio when we talk about

like elevator pitch. You know

my elevator pitch. Okay. So I started going to Birdie Man in 1999. So I'm one of those that was post century.

Yeah, we'll get into that. Yeah. Yeah,

we'll get into that. Um but I became uh I started uh producing the LA Compression Festival in 2002 with a bunch of my friends. We were just like let's get the band together type of thing. Um that grew grew uh over the 15 years of my producing it from an 800 person event to an 8,000 person event.

Wow.

Um and uh and there's a whole bunch of statistics that go along with that that I won't get into right now. And then in 2017, I was like, you know, I'm going to take a break. I've been doing this long enough. I became an official regional contact in 2009. So, I did a lot before I got, you know, the org's blessing.

And then in uh 2009, I started a not for profofit called the LA League of Arts that became an official 501c3 in 2011. Actually, November 11, 2011. So 1111.

Yeah.

And um and 17.

When did you become a regional contact? When when did you first

2009

2009. Oh, okay.

Yeah. So 2002 I started producing decom and a whole bunch of events in the LA underground scene and a whole bunch of like I did a lot of stuff. Also in 2009 I produced the uh LA Burning Man film festival in partnership with the Egyptian Theater in American Cinema Tech. So we had one Burning Man documentary every month for six months in their big theater. We took over the courtyard and did like a decom style with art and art cars and activities and theme camps

and right on Hollywood Boulevard. So that was super cool and a lot of fun. We even had Larry and Marian come in for a Q&A. Uh, we showed I think it was during Journey to the Flames and then they came in and we did a big Q&A with the creators of Journey to the Flames, Doug Jacobson and Steve Binder. And Doug Jacobson now is my business partner with BRCVR, which is now Burner Sphere. And so in 2020, so in 2017, I was like, I'm done. I'm taking a break. I spent all of 2016, uh, handing over each one of the duties that I did, whether it was board elections or producing decon. and all the elements of that or newbie orientations. It was like so many things that I did. So I spent the entire year uh secession planning of like this is when I would do this who wants to take it over and then I would teach that person how to do that thing and then they would document it. So there was institutional knowledge uh created in a notebook that could be handed on to the next person and and then I stepped down in 2017 and I was like okay I'm done. I don't need to go back. I feel very complete with all of this. And then 2020 happened and 2020 was the uh of course uh COVID and Burning Man couldn't happen. And there was this little project that we started in um in 2015 uh with an a local artist in LA uh and he created this like virtual playa based off of 2014. It was single player, Google Cardboard, very rudimentary. The org kind of liked it. I'm glad that we had the uh privilege to show it to Larry

before he passed away uh which was lovely and he liked it

but it was missing community and without community it's just an archival tool and what's the difference of video or photograph and so he's like you know it's great but

what are you gonna do with it?

Yeah.

Wasn't much we could do with it

and then in 20 because of COVID. Uh Doug wanted to throw a birthday party. He was having a big birthday.

Um we're all 1970 babies, so you can do the math.

Oh, yeah.

And and so we um he contacted our friend Greg who was like, "Well, you know, I have this play. You could use that for your party." And Doug was already playing on the Alt Space platform.

So, uh Greg got the hard drive off of the shelf, blew the dust off of it, and and hoping it would spin up. Back in the days when hard drives had moving parts,

children, we had hard drives with moving parts. Now we don't have hard drives with moving parts. So much better. But u there was a time when we had these floppy discs. They were five and a half inch. Remember?

And to use the phone, there was a rotary dial and you had to spin it around

dial on the phone and you couldn't even fit one single JPEG on a five and a half inch now.

Yeah. uh

the JPEGs that we have now, you couldn't even fit it on one. Anyway,

so 2020,

so 2020, it gets uploaded on April 3rd of 2020. So, we just celebrated our 5year anniversary of that happening. Wow.

And I'm in Mexico, narrowly escaping Panama as the borders are shutting down and that's a whole other story.

And I uh I get a phone call and it's Greg and Doug and they're like, "Oh my god, do you have a computer with you?" I'm like, Yes. Like, can you can you uh open it and load this program? And I'm in like six megabytes per second.

So, it takes a half an hour to load the program. It takes 11 minutes for the program to open and I need to like build an avatar and set up my account and whatever. And they're patient. They're just on the phone with me. And uh and um and I'm in Zippo, Mexico. And I find get everything set up and I spawn into the space of the link that they sent me and I'm standing with them on Playa.

Wow.

And the three of us are together. One's in Northridge, one's in downtown LA, and I'm in Mexico and we're just talking to each other and I hang up the phone

and we're there and it's remarkable. And uh so then I immediately call diver Dave.

Oh yeah.

Who Yeah, who we had talked to originally when we were looking at the project in 2015. He was the one person that really understood the future potential of it. So I contacted him and I was like, "Oh my god, Dave, you know," and I'm hopping back. You won't believe it. You won't believe it. We have this and it's social VR. I'm talking a mile a minute

and he's like,

"I'm jumping on a call in 10 minutes with Burning Man. Can I tell them what you did?" I was like, "Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. tell them what I did. Tell them what I did. And I was like, "Can I be on that call? Can I be on that call?" And he and so he got on the call and they had their meeting and then I get a ping on my phone with the link.

And so then I jump on the Zoom call and I'm like, "Oh my god, I have to show you." And I share screen on my computer with Altspace running and I show them the virtual Playa and I tell them what we've what we have and we're like we're ready.

Uhhuh. we're ready. We can invite the community tomorrow. We're on a working platform and the ply is there and

wow.

And so they said that they were looking at other things. Burning Man hadn't canceled yet. They weren't even sure that they were going to cancel it, but they were looking at options.

Was this like early 2020? Like what, March or something?

This was April. April.

So April 3rd.

Uhhuh. April 3rd.

I guess April 4th. Okay. April 4th. Because April 3rd they uploaded it and then April 4th I contacted Diver Dave. It was the very next day and it was 10 minutes after that phone call to him that they were having their tech meeting or their Burning Man meeting with tech people to find out what what would happen if Burning Man needed to cancel.

And then one week later on April

10thish maybe. Yeah.

10th Marian announced the uh cancellation of Bernie.

Wow. and she said my favorite quote of hers ever, and I don't remember if it was that time or the next time, but one of the cancellations, she said, "You can cancel Black Rock City, but you can't cancel Burning Man."

Ahu.

And I was like, "Yes,

that's right.

Exactly." And it ignited the regional network like I had never seen before. All these little tiny pod events popped up everywhere

and we were one of six platforms. We weren't the only one really.

We were the one that was VR ccentric, so in a VR headset

is is what we were. It worked on the computer. And

what were the other ones?

There was um uh Build-A-Bear, which was adorable.

That was on a platform that was like a graphic novel. Worked on the computer. It was black and white, like a little drawing. You had this little character that you walked on a map. It was super cute. That was Goldberg. Very easy interface. And I don't know where they are. Like I don't I don't know that that platform even exists anymore.

Flashes in the pan.

Flashes in the pan. Um, there was Portal which was people submitting YouTube videos and YouTube lives. So, it was a big YouTube platform thing. There was Sparkle Vverse which was all Zoom. It was Zoom rooms and breakouts and it was every possible way that you could use Zoom.

Um, and so that was Sparkleverse. There was um,

um, Dusty Multiverse which was on your cell phone. That was a cell phone interface that worked on um Android and and iOS.

Um I I uh was on it once.

Um but I never I was spending so much time producing BRCVR that I really didn't get to spend too much time on all the other platforms.

Um Ste Multiverse I was on once, but I just I don't even like playing games on my cell phone.

Uhhuh.

So doing VR on my cell phone I was like even Zoom calls on my cell phone. I have to like flip through to look at all the people. So, it's just not not the interface that I enjoy.

Um and then there was um Infinite Playa. I was so excited about Infinite Play. Now, that platform got it's called Infinite Reality. They got bought by some company who's now like they just purchased Napster and like a whole bunch of others. Like I don't know what their grand uh scheme is. but um like what their business model is, but they're supposedly doing big things. Um they bought a physical studio space in Long Beach.

H

I was like, but I don't know what they're doing. But anyway, so that was Infinite Playa and that was Unreal Engine and Pixel Streaming and we just don't have the infrastructure for it yet. Um or we definitely didn't in 2020,

but it was really beautiful. But you needed a powerful PC.

It didn't work on Mac. You needed a powerful P like in order to participate.

Um, and I think that's that's the six.

I think that's the six. And then us, we um we were super popular. We didn't have to build anything from scratch.

Um, just like the 3D assets.

Okay.

And I went and did what I do best, which was community building. I reached out to the different Burning Man departments, different artists, theme camps. I was like, "Come on, we're going to participate. This is how you do it." And Uh, we had tutorials. We ended up teaching a number of people how to use Blender and Unity. Oh, wow.

And I know a handful of people that that's now what they do professionally.

Wow.

Because of BRCVR and learning it for the burn,

they then were able to make a living doing it.

Wow.

Which is really cool.

So, would it be the equivalent of like of its own kind of regional group now or something like

Um, I would think so, but um Burning Man has decided that no, it's not its own regional. They have a digital regional. It's called Burn Two and it is on second.

Uh

yeah, that's still going. That's been going on since 2015.

Really?

And yeah, and in in 2020, what was interesting is they didn't do one of the virtual offerings, which I don't I don't know.

They have events that they do like they have an October decom type of event. And then they have something that they do in the springtime. Um, and they still do it regularly and they still have users. It's a 2D interface on your computer. Um, and it's on Second Life and they've built this uh world that they still use and they have regular

Is it like an ongoing just like world kind of thing or they just use it for like pre like I said like for events? It's like oh we're going to do a decom.

They have their own world and then they use it for events and I think it's two events a year but there might be others. I'm not in incredibly involved in the community. I am on their email list so I see it as the events come on and I I know the two big events because during COVID we didn't just do the virtual burn. We started doing like weekly events and then we did some Yeah. We did a gratitude event in November and then we did like a decom event in October and then we did reburn in January

and twice we ended up doing our event without even realizing it at the same time that they were doing theirs.

Ah,

and in LA as a regional contact, I was always like talking to all the different groups to figure out like so we didn't overlap so we didn't bifurcate the community.

Yeah,

we kept f****** up with bird two and bifurcating the community. We're like, "No, but it's the same time."

Um, uh, they forgave us and and we forgave them and it was just it it just, you know, it happened. Um, and Uh but yeah, so um but that's still going on and they're technically a regional. They're like contracted a regional organization. They're the only digital

so

well how exactly does uh the BRCVR work then? Like so if somebody want to like uh join it like how would you go about it?

Um so I'm gonna finish what I what I was getting ready to say about so our relationship to Burning Man because that will lead into to uh how people can join. Okay. So, our relationship to Burning Man is that we're collaborating with them.

So, we're we're in collaboration. We have uh it took about two years for us to develop the agreement the that's between Burning Man, the Burning Man project and our subsidiary. So, we have a company I started a company called Big Rock Creative BRC.

We thought it was funny and snarky. Uh then it became really confusing. That's BRCVR.

Um, that's the Big Rock Creative, Black Rock City, Big Rock Creative. We thought we'd be cute. We were going to do it for one year and then it it it blew up. And now Big Rock Creative actually has a lot of commercial clients

like Microsoft, the United Nations, T-Mobile, Google, like we've worked for some really big names building immersive social VR for them,

uh, for their teams and for the public and for their brand.

So, we're kind of commercial. Now,

so we created a subsidiary called Duct Tape and Zip Ties that produces BRCVR presents Burner Sphere. And Burner Sphere is a standalone app. So, it is its own thing. We're not on somebody else's platform. We're not asking you to sign up on somebody else's platform anymore.

Altspace no longer exists. In March of 23, Microsoft sunset Altspace permanently.

Yeah, I'm here with very bad. We um we had memorial services. I delivered a eulogy for the platform. Uh we had our final party at the end of January of 23 um called Reburn. And that is something that we'll continue to do. And that was the first time that we took footage that we filmed at Burning Man. We have a media agreement with Burning Man. We could go and we could film. Um uh Doug Jacobson uh has been filming at Burning Man since 1998 and had one of the largest and longest running documentary projects called Journey to the Flames.

And so it was natural for us to go and film and we wanted to film the projects that were part of the digital offering in 2020 and 2021 physically in 2022. So we did photogometry, we shot in 360 and 180 and we captured all of this stuff. We had three film crews was running around all over the place and then we did Reburn which was a combination of the physical and the digital and it was s super successful. Uh and we had to kind of hack Altspace to get it to work and that made us realize that in order to tell the story that we wanted to tell the story of the communities that make up Burning Man, which is a community of communities, we needed to do it with social VR

and we started looking for a platform and we looked at 50 60 I have a spreadsheet of all these platforms because we'd go to one and we check it out and it does this and this and this and this and but not this and this and this.

So I have this whole spreadsheet

and finally we made the crazy decision to build our own.

Wow.

And it's insane. But I would say every largecale Burning Man project is insane.

Yes.

Every Temple is insane. Every man base is insane. Noggin the Captain S was insane. Um the Pure Group, they're just insane. Walter's insane. May Warrior's insane. Long Fen is insane. I can just go on and on and on. The bigger it gets. Skydivers diving in insane. The fact that we have an airport is insane. The fact that Black Rock City. This is insane. It's all in.

Well, it kind of brings me to like an interesting point cuz like a lot of these like large projects like um like core, right? You know, like that kind of started like I I sent out like an email just like hey is this how about this crazy idea and I remember like Bernie man just being like that's insane. We couldn't possibly do it. I was like oh yeah well how about I'll just like take it on and then you start start the process. And then all these people kind of climate and then once I kind of demonstrated that like okay like we have this big thing and it's going and and that the momentum is moving Then Bernie man is like, "Okay, now we'll come in and take it over." Like it almost seems like every large project kind of starts that way. You just like you go like, "I got this great idea about this virtual reality platform." Like, "Yeah, yeah, yeah, whatever." You know, we're not going to do that. You know, that's kind of crazy. How about you do that and then we'll take it from you.

Yeah, exactly. Well, but they're not taking it from Not yet.

Whatever.

Not yet.

Or we'll talk. Yeah. Yeah.

We We'll talk We'll talk about it. We'll talk about it. Yeah. Um there was a clause in in the agreement. that uh that that allows for a change of hands.

But um

yeah, so they're giving us room to explore all the possibilities of what this digital community could be. But at its core, I'm going back to the core project, which by the way was breathtaking and beautiful. And for those that are listening that don't know about the core project, it was is um every region was given the option of submitting a 20 foot tall Max effigy that represent their region that was built by their region that would come to Burning Man and be a ring around the man

which was uh scary and crazy that we were going to burn all 12

simultaneously

down the man just for the listeners core was stood for a circle of regional effort Gez.

Yeah.

Yeah. Yeah. So, I mean,

you did it the next year.

Yeah. So, the LA So, was it 2011? I think that was 2012.

It was 2012.

No, 2011 was the first one. The first year,

2012 was the second one.

Yeah. Cuz 2011 was actually my last year and then I took off like 13 years and I actually went back last year for like it was my first time, you know, back. But it was funny cuz like 2011 that was the first year it sold out and 2024 is the first year it didn't sold out and I just kind I was like ah sort of miss all the sold out years.

I don't know what happened. Whatever.

Whatever.

But uh but no, but core was incredible. Um

core was incredible. It was a great and and on the digital play, we're going to do

Oh, really?

Like core. Yeah. I really want to bring that back because

the digital playa has the ability to connect us. It's so accessible.

Yeah.

And it has the ability to connect us across all country lines. Yeah.

And I want people to know that that there's a burn happening in your backyard or close to your backyard that you can get involved in. When we did the virtual burn in 2020, there was this whole group of people from Spain that were into VR that loved like bouncing around together and they um and it was like I don't know there was like 10 15 people and we ran into them all the time and they loved exploring our worlds and we'd run into them all the time and I remember we were going on a world crawl and they were with us and they were like, "These are amazing." Like the like how do we get how do we learn more about your community and and they told us that we were in Spain and I was like Spain you guys have a great burner community in Spain like you have nowhere and and that and so I started sending them links and then I realized that this is the tool. This is the tool. People come onto the platform and they learn about Burning Man and they learn about the culture and the community and they want to get more involved. And and so I want to invite so once we launch which is happening in June um then I want to invite the regionals to what is your effigy and then what is your regional story because we can put the effigy on the playa and then people can then take the portal into the world and learn about nowhere and maybe there's a world that looks just like nowhere and Africa burn and flip side and Element 11 and Otherworld and I'm getting ready to go to Dragon Burn this year which I'm super excited about.

Is that the Japan?

China.

Oh, China.

No, that's China.

Yeah. Wow.

Yeah, that's China. So, I'm very excited. Um, but people need to know like even you were like that Japan? Is that China? But you'll be able to come into the burner sphere and learn about what's happening globally

and how you can get involved.

That's really necessary. cuz I mean at this point I mean there's I don't know there there's not very many ways for people to learn about that. I mean there's like the the burner map thing you know like on the Burning Man website but like the information like the links it points to I mean a lot of it's like really out ofdate you know like

we're all so visual.

Yeah.

If you just think about how much we doom scroll on social media. We look at these quick little videos and that's how we get our information. It's not reading a website. Yeah. Oh, yeah.

It's not clicking on a Y.

It's kind of like 1990s like Yeah. Like

Yeah. So, we're like a three-dimensional immersive social VR information super highway.

So, okay. So, uh so Burner Sphere um like how do how would how would people like what what what would be how would you uh how would people get on it or uh or are you pointing people at that yet?

We are. Yeah, we are. So, um we're going to be opening up our alpha version in like two weeks and we're going to start inviting the first few people onto the platform mainly to test our servers to make sure it can handle it because I know when we launch

it's going to be like you know like you have a faucet and then you have a fire hose. So we're going to do faucet right now and the minute we launch it's going to be fire hose.

But do you have like a website or something where people can at least go to just like

Yeah. burnersphere.com br s pere e.com. I'll put that in the show notes. Yeah.

Yeah, please. And you can sign up for our alpha. You can fill out the form. Uh right now it you're required to have a Quest 2, three, or 3S headset. We're building for VR first.

Um but it will work on a uh desktop computer, Mac or PC.

Oh, awesome.

So when we launch in June, we will will have fingers crossed our desktop computer version ready for you so that you can join us on Ed 2D screen. It's so much better and more immersive in VR and I'm a big fan of VR so I do recommend it but not everyone can afford a VR headset.

I will say and I don't want to promote um Meta

but they did just make the headset super affordable

at well it was $2.99 when it came out but I heard because of the current um tariff situation that they're gonna raise the price to 3.99, but $3.99 for a VR headset is,

you know, I don't remember the last time I spent less than $1,000 for my phone.

And you don't get game decks for less than $1,500. So $300 for a VR headset is very affordable. And then you get access to the content 247, 365. days a year. Wow.

We are going to charge a membership.

Okay.

So, you join and you pay your camp dues.

Now, at Burning Man, when you pay camp dues, it's because your money is going to make the camp happen, whatever that offering is to the community and whatever the shared expenses are.

So, I did math backwards and I looked at how much it's going to cost in servers. We have to have um I think it's three or four different servers to run this platform for all the different content that's coming in. Um and we wanted to have a secure database. Um we wanted people to be able to take pictures and share pictures inside and all of that takes up space. Okay. And then we have the developers and the they're you know constantly squashing bugs and so we have to have this team.

So it's $48 a year in is what our current numbers are based off of. No. Right. It's not bad. Now, obviously, as we scale,

we're going to have to probably raise prices a little bit.

Um,

but right now, the numbers, if we get 80,000 people, which is the population of Burning Man,

we will be able to not just survive, but thrive and keep adding more functionality to the platform. We also want to start a digital arts fund like the honorarium

where artists can submit their models for the art that they want to bring.

Oh wow.

To play to regional to a city near you

and uh or make art for the sake of digital art like you're not restricted by physics. You whatever you want

you know like where people have to do like a like a theme camp like the questionnaire and you have to submit like like a map or they want like oh you want to see what this looks like visually or like your art car, whatever. It's like you could have like a dual use thing. It's like this could be useful for me in real life, but then now I have these files and then now they'll be moved over to here. Like win-win.

So on a future road map. Perfect segue.

We do have on our road map and it's already being built, but it won't be at launch, but it'll be

soon after. So maybe for the burn 26,

we're going to have a toolkit and we're going to give you space. So you're going to get the ability to go into a blank player world um with your toolkit and all your campmates

and be like, "We're going to take this car and we're just going to put it here and then we're going to take this RV and we're going to put it over here and we're going to take this dome and put it here, but the dome is going to be bigger." So, you just stretch it out and you make it bigger and you can lay out your entire camp

by physically putting things digitally, physically putting things in the space and then walk around with your campmates and decide whether the flow actually works

and oh, we can't fit six RVs over here. So, let's do four and two. And you can pick it up

and just move it where you want to your fuel station here. And we're going to have we have generators, cabling, stripper pole, um go go boxes, uh hookah, solar panels, um Like

evaporation ponds. Like, oh, that's nasty.

Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. No, we don't have evaporation ponds, but you shouldn't be building one. No, they don't work. They become mud. There's

Oh, come on. You got to have that.

We tried an evap pond. They were like, "Evapat pond." I'm like, "You should put that in there." People would be like, "What is this squared like little swampy thing in the corner of your camp?" You know,

it's a kitty pool.

But, okay, one thing I just thought of is uh the numbers you put It might be a little bit low. Like we said like 80,000 people cuz I I think the current numbers I remember 2 years ago or so the estimate was somewhere around like the number of people who've attended Burning Man plus at all the regionals was somewhere around 800,000 and I think now it's probably closer to like a million or something. I mean but I mean you have to figure also like what percentage of those people are just like kind of like one and done kind of bucket list people. It's like okay maybe a good couple hundred thousand people but like still I mean we're talking about like like longtime burners or people gone for like many many years like probably at least a half a million or more

right I was just at let me find here we go hold on I was just at MAL which is the Mid-Atlantic leadership conference and it was in Philadelphia

and um Muse was there and she gave a report and these are public numbers I'm not sharing anything that I can't share and she said that 102,000 people attended regional events across the world

in the last year.

In the last year.

Wow.

So more people attend regional events

than Black Rock City. There are 85 official regional events. There are 235 regional contacts in 105 regions across 34 countries. There was 1.77 million given in art grants which we We are hoping to add to

um

um let's see there are

five locally organized leadership events. So like Mel and BAM and there's a European one. Yeah.

Um

is it burn after reading? Is that another one?

Burn after meeting.

Burn after meeting. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah.

Yeah. The burn after meeting. Yeah.

Um burn after reading is and now it's a whole other thing. So when they say like what was thatund and something thousand

102,000

so how would do they define these are these including like just kind of like gettogethers meet and greets or are they talking about just like like like multi-day

burns regional events.

So these are official regional events.

So are they like multi-day like like events or are they just kind of looking

It includes decoms too which are

Oh okay. All right.

But official regional. So it includes decom. So like I once went to the to the the Dutch decom in uh in Amsterdam.

Oh, wow.

And they had like 5,000 people.

Really?

Yeah. Wow.

It was like this huge warehouse. It was like I don't know how many layers it there was like a basement and then there was the ground floor and then Oh, there was like the subbase, the basement, the ground floor, and then there was like two floors above. I don't know. I walked so many stairs at that event.

I I I was I I I got to a point where it's like I couldn't dance and I couldn't walk another staircase.

Yeah. I hope you wear appropriate shoes.

I was wearing flats with a memory soul insoles and them. Um, which by the way I once wore on Playa and the memory foam turned into like this weird like the Playa dust got into the memory foam and then the sweat from my feet and it turned into like this squishy. I don't advise memory foam insoles in your shoes on Playa.

Everywhere else they're great,

but I had to throw those away.

Wow. I don't I don't I don't know what happened. Um so but anyway,

so but it includes decom. So like when I did decom I you know we got up to 8,000 people but then they there's also Equinox which is I think like 1500 people.

Wow.

So it it in it includes both.

So uh let's get back to your Burning Man experience. So what was the first you said 1999 was the first year you went to the playa. So uh what what got you to go to Burning Man? Like what what uh what was what what grabbed you? What hooked you?

I I bought to go to Burning Man actually. The first year that I actually bought a ticket was 1997

and then I was working as an actress in LA and I booked something. I don't remember what it was. I just remember that it prevented me from going to Burning Man in 97. Um and so I um I think I just gave my ticket to somebody and then in 98 I bought a ticket and again booked work and I couldn't go. And then in 1999, I just told my agent. I was like, "Nope,

block off this time.

Block off this time. I'm going." But I was already going to Rainbow Gatherings. I was already part of Moon Tribe.

Um, so I was already doing raves in the middle of the desert and I was part of the art community in LA and already very active in that scene. And it was just like, it was like these whispers, Birdie Man. Burning Man. Oh, did you heard of Birdie Man? Oh, have you heard about Birdie Man? It was like this like like underground kind of like what is this? What is this thing? But I wanted to go. So in 1999, hell or high water, there was nothing that was going to stop me from going and I went to Burning Man. I have an epic first time at Burning Man story.

Oh yeah, tell that.

So at Burning Man, my uh very first year, my very first five minutes on Playa. So I went there with a friend of mine in his brand new convertible. uh like BMW

and loaded full of brand new bikes, brand new tent, brand like we bought everything.

Wow.

And we get there and we find a place to park on the very last street which was D.

And I think 1999 was also like the first year of streets, like the first year of the time city

like I think the was that the year the theme was time. So then the streets actually were like 2 o'clock 3:00 like Yeah, something like that.

I think 99 was the first year of that. Yeah, I think it was before that it was like I know it was like um compass points or something like that and she like oh

the compass per the compass points happened on floating world.

Floating world.

That was never going to happen again.

Yeah,

people can understand a clock. Anybody from anywhere in the world can

I'm at 322 degrees like Yeah.

Yeah. No. So anyway, so you arrived in this brand new this convertible

car with brand new things and I was like I'm home. So I took all my clothes and I had a hat and sandals. And we opened up the trunk. We started pulling everything out to get set up for camp. And down the street comes this Viking ship with all these people painted in gold with horns and and they were screaming something, but I couldn't really understand what they were screaming. I also had no context, but it was something sounded something like raise a man, raise a man, raise a man. And I'm like, what is that?

What is this raisin man?

What is this? And this guy side as he goes by, you know, slowly

and and says, "Come with us." And I reached up. I'm like, "Wow."

You got reached down.

I got Shanghai. He reached down and I'm actually going to Shanghai. So, um, uh,

Shanghai yourself. Like, yeah,

I am. He reached down, grabbed my wrist

and pulled me up onto the onto the ship

and like I weighed five pounds. Wow.

I I probably weighed like a 100 pounds maybe back then. So, he pulled me up onto the ship and now I'm on the ship and I turn and I look with a gold fingerprint on my wrist. I turn and I look and I see my friend and I just wave. I'm like, "Ah,

I'll be back.

Bye." And then the ship just started going in and out and around and through. And so I had no idea where my camp was because I never stopped for a moment to look and get my bearings. We just parked.

We were setting up camp. It wasn't like I am at,

you know, D and 4.

We just off we went.

I'm sure. But when you come back like after dark, it'll look exactly like that. No one else will have camp nearby. Like

after dark? Try three days.

What?

Took me three days to find my camp.

What? All right. Well, where we getting ahead of ourselves?

So, the the ship goes out and it goes and collects a whole bunch of people. We get full and we start heading out towards the center of the city and the man is there like facing down or back down, but he's lying down

and uh and there's ropes off of him and he's on like he's got like these two points and now we're going to

like Egyptian slave labor, pull the ropes and pull him up. And it took it felt like a couple hours. Um I don't remember exactly how long it took, but it felt like a couple hours. I started on the ropes and then I got like the tap on the shoulder of Hey little girl, you don't weigh enough to be on these ropes. We're going to put big burly dude on the ropes. And I was, you know, I got all deflated of like, oh, I wanted to help. And that's how I learned how to be uh in service of the art

uh and how to be a fluffer. And I ran around and I blotted people's heads because you can't take your hands off the ropes. I gave people sunblock. I fed people grapes. I gave them water. Um, all sorts of stuff. Fed people watermelon. So, and and then got the seeds back in my hands because they couldn't

spit in my hands, please.

Don't move. Um, but you learn how to really be in service because this was a grand communal effort to raise the man.

Was it on the hay bales?

He was on hay bales. The last year of um

of the safety third of that man.

Um, but yeah, he was on hay bales and we raised him up and uh walked around and I was like, "Oh, I have no idea where my camp is, where my friend John is, where anything is." And just as I was like starting to get a little worried, this group of people came over and they're like, "Hey, if you guys are done, we're building our art over here and we could really use your help." I was like, "Okay, I got nothing else to do." So, I go over and they and they gave me clothes. They were like, "Nudity and power tools. Mm-m. So, I got you like they gave me a shirt and somebody gave me a pair of booty shorts and gloves and I, you know, started uh helping them and I grew up around power tools, so it was no stranger to me. I helped them build their art and then they were like breaking for a meal. So, I went back to their camp and I ate with them. And then there was somebody across the road that was having a hard time setting up their tent. So, I went over there and I helped them set up their tent and Then they gave me clothes and then, you know, because I'm telling them the plight of not knowing where I am. And then they were like, "Wait, you need to carry water with you." You know, here's a little place to sleep.

Put on your back and here's your water and some snacks and go. And so I'm off on my merry way. I spent three days bouncing around the Playa, helping people, acquiring supplies and living, finding places to sleep, finding projects to get involved. in and then finally made it back and found John and he was sitting there in a lawn chair with the whole camp set up in a pink dress

cuz I can't remember what the name of it was but somebody made some movie it was a whole like plyier provides thing where is like I'm going to show up at the gate completely nude and with no ticket and no nothing. And I mean I think it's

copied me I did it originally.

Yeah. Yeah. I think it kind of set a bad precedent cuz I think like for years after that people were just like I can just go to Bernie and not prepare for anything, you know? It's like, "Ah, great. Thanks." You know, but

well, see, now I teach orientations because I don't want anybody to have to do what I just did.

Yeah. Yeah. Wow.

But I mainlined the Kool-Aid. I jumped right into communal effort.

Yeah.

And you know, I I it it was an amazing first year and I went back almost every year after that. This year will be my 22nd year

like in a row. Well, I mean other than 20 21. years off.

Yeah.

I started in 99 and this is 2025 and this is only 22 years. So there's definitely a few years in there that I didn't go.

Yeah, you can get your 25 year patch.

Uh I have to go a few more years because

I would I would love to get a 25-y year patch. When do they give you the watch?

Well, it's funny because like I because my first year was 96 and like Yeah, I didn't go every year but um Who is it? I think it was Ebynthia made these like uh 25 year. Did you see there's one? It was like a gold watch like patch. And so like I actually got got one of those.

Yeah, she did make those.

Yeah. So So where do you camp with that now at the Burning Man?

Um I've been in a lot of camps. Uh but right now I call Black Rockck Earbook my home.

Uhu.

And we actually have a BRCVR camp that is a hub with Black Rockck Earbook. So, Black Rockck Yearbook is all photographies and the BRCVR camp is photography crews that go out and and shoot photoggramometry and video and interviews for Burner Sphere.

So, it made sense for us all to be together. Um, plus Doug is one of the organizers of BlackRock Yearbook. Yearbook. He set up a photo studio

and people come and um

uh in ther ply finest

or not, but we get a lot of people that dress up and they come with their friends and they get a photo taken either groups or individuals and you have to use your ply names. We don't use any real name. So, if you don't have a ply name, we'll help you get one. And then after Burning Man is when our art really happens and you end up getting um uh we put the whole book together. And so, if you go to blackrackyearbook.com, you can see the yearbook from the past. All going all the way back to 2007. We've been taking photographs of uh burners and I think it's the longest running individual photography project.

Huh. Project of burner individuals.

And where in the player are they?

Like usually

that's like a that's like a placement question.

Yeah. Well, I mean people are you going to put us this year?

Well, we were at nine and B. We're like 9:45 and B. Um, one year they stuck us on the 5:00 back street side. Our preference is to be in Center Camp Circle.

Many years we were either in Center Camp Circle,

not in the plaza, but like in the circle or Rod's Road, which no longer exists. Yeah. One year we were like B and Rod's Road, which is the most confusing corner because that's like where 530 and B and Rod's Road all meet. Yeah.

And so our address was like 530 and Raj Road.

Uhhuh.

So it was like hard for people to find us. That was in 2022. And then 23 were Center Camp Plaza, Center Camp Circle, um at like 245, something like that.

Um and then last year we were way out at 9:45 and between A and B,

but our frontage was on B.

And then this year. I don't know. Hopefully center camp circle. We would love to be back there. Yeah.

Um in 23 we were next door to the passport office. So it was perfect because people would like

go get their passport and then come get their picture taken.

Yeah. Yeah. Yeah.

But it worked out really well. So hopefully we'll we'll be next to Passport again.

Yeah. No, I mean it just seems like that that's the type of camp that you you' be good to have like more of like a a public kind like frontage kind of thing, you know? It's like a place where people can can behind you, not just buried like, "Oh, yeah, we're 3:15 and Jay or something, you know."

Well, and and you you come and you hang out in our lounge. We we have a bar, so you can get a cocktail or you can get electrolytes or you can add alcohol to your electrolytes and then um which defeats the purpose. And then right, here have some electrolytes. Pour some vodka in it.

There you go.

Um and then and then get your picture taken, get your player name. Uh we have games you can play. You can just hang out in our lounge.

Uh this year because the theme is tomorrow today

and we're, you know, burners sphere and where we are.

The the yearbook photos are from 10 to 4 or somewhereish in there.

And then at five o'clock, we're going to start we're going to do tech talks. We're going to do um uh demonstrations. We're going to bring VR headsets with us and let people run around Burner Sphere, show them some other fun stuff that's going in. We're going to try to bring people in to uh talk about emerging technologies, talk about AI, uh talk about how the principles actually fit into the metaverse, which is a talk that I often give. It's why I'm actually going to China is I'm going to be talking at a tech conference about the principles and how they fit into the metaverse.

Wow. Incredible. Okay. Um well, let's see. I wanted to get also get into your background. So, what was your life like before Burning Man? like what was uh

where' your exist where did you grow up? I mean like how did how did the was your lead in a leadup to all this? You said you're a 70s baby like me. I was born in 71 like Yeah.

born in 70

experienced the 70s the wonders of the

80s life before computers.

Yeah.

Where you actually went outside and and played in the street.

Yeah. Yeah.

Drink from the drank from the uh hose.

Fire hose. Oh yeah. You grew up in LA from the hose. I grew up in Texas. Actually, I grew up in Corpus Christie, Texas. Oh.

Uh with hurricanes and um and swimming in the Gulf of Mexico.

Um

not the Gulf of America.

Exponentially. Oh, yeah. Right.

Gulf of Mexico.

Anyway,

I can't believe Google Maps like changed it like that.

Yeah. Anyway,

whatever.

Um yes, I grew up on the Well, when I grew up there, it was the Gulf of Mexico

and um beautiful sandy beaches, warm water, all year long. Um, and then in 96 I moved to Los Angeles to pursue a career in acting and I did a lot of it. I did a lot of acting. Um, commercials, television, film, a little bit of everything. I was on soaps. I was on TVC. Like, you know, when you're an actress, it's

sort of like whatever whatever role you get, whatever flavor of the month you are. Um, I still do acting. My agent still submits me. I still do projects here and there. Um, I have a I still have a pharmaceutical ad that's still running that I shot um in 21, I think,

but they loved it so much that it's getting traction, so they keep it.

Um,

so yeah. And then uh so yeah, so my background is acting, but I'm also really good at production.

So lots of times when you do lowbudget films, you end up doing more than one thing. So it's like, hey, we're going to bring you on as an actress, and then you get on set and they don't have a line producer. So, I can do line producing or a script supervisor or, you know, somebody to help out with costumeuming. And so, you just sort of do a little of everything. And then I got really good at producing and then producing large scale events doing decom. I didn't know what I was doing when we started. Three, four years in, I'm now consulting. I'm an advisor for different organizations that are doing events in LA and helping them pull their permits. and becoming an authority in the matter. If

Birdie Man gives you the permission to try something that you've never done before.

Yes.

Right. Oh, yeah.

So, you want to build a big piece of art, but you don't know how to weld. Go find welders. Now, you have a big piece of art. In the process, you learn how to weld and by the time you get done, you're an expert.

So, there's this, you know, Birdman gives you permission to try. I didn't know anything about virtual reality when we started BRCVR. And I learned it all and I learned the technology. I learned how to to organize and I I learned business and I learned like all of this stuff in the process of doing and now I'm being sent to all these tech conferences to stand in front of an audience of technology

share what you learned. Yeah.

And talk to them about the future and uh and so that that all came from being granted the permission to just try something. It's why I love Burning Man so much

is that it's a amateur wonderland.

Yeah. Well, this kind of leads into the Uh the final question uh what is the impact of Burning Man on your life? It's like your shadow like how what uh you know like what is it uh because like something I always like ask people you it's like why why do this all these years? I mean there's some people it's a bucket list thing. They go just once and like hey I check it off the list but like there's many of us it's like there's some people it's more than half their lives. Some people it's their entire lives you know and then and it's like they you spend incredible amounts of money. You go you go through a relationship ships. I mean, but yet we still keep coming back. But like like why what does it mean to you? How has it affected you? It's like why is it worth it?

Why is it worth it? Well, to the core of my being, I'm a muse.

I am here to help facilitate the creative process. And Burning Man gave me a uh an unlimited supply of artists that I could help inspire and facilitate their creative process.

So even Burnerphere and BRCVR and LA Decom, they were all so that artists could showcase their art. Burners is a giant showcase. We're going to have all this art in Burners and people are going to get to learn about the artists. Uh they're gonna we're, you know, we're going to have little um uh annotations so that people know what the art is. what the name of it is, who made it, where they're from, how they can get involved, why this art exists in the first place, the artist statement, all of that is going to be there. When we did LA Decom, we always wanted people to learn as much as possible and connect with the theme camps and the art installation so that they could get more involved. And so, it's constantly in service of the art. And that is that is what we that is that is our goal. That is my goal. um is to help facilitate the creative process. Foster community by helping facilitate the creative process because the more people I bring into a project, the more likely that project is going to succeed.

Oh yeah.

Burning Man helped me believe in myself and my ability to succeed so that then I can help others believe in themselves and help them succeed and And so that is why Burning Man runs in the veins and through every cell of my body. That's why I jumped in like I did that very first moment that I was at Burning Man when I got hoisted up onto a Viking ship and led out into the playa and told to raise the man. I have been raising the man every moment since.

Wow. It's like it's funny cuz I have a very similar kind of thing where it's like people ask like oh what's what if you had to choose one of your favorite which is of the 10 principles it's like or I don't know I think gifting or you know it's like like you're talking about just like being a muse or like giving back or helping other people even this this this podcast this show I'm doing for people you know it's like it's I'm not so interested in just it's like oh what I what can I extract what can I drill down and like extract out of the Bernie man community you know more of just like what Can I give back? It's like, well, what are you getting from that? It's just like, who cares?

Like, who cares?

I can tell you what I get back.

Yeah.

I get back social capital.

Ah,

and social capital is more valuable than any fiat currency that you have in your pocket.

Oh, yeah.

In your bank account. Social capital is always there for you when everything else is gone. As long as you have social capital, you'll actually be fine because my favorite uh principle is communal effort

and communal effort actually pulls in and ties together the other nine because communal effort invites participation.

If you are going to build something larger than yourself, larger than you can do yourself,

then you need to have communal effort. You need to invite participation and you have to be radically inclusive.

Oh yeah.

Right. You you can't be like, "Well,

I would invite you to weld on this project. I don't have any other welders, but I'm not going to because you're not exactly the type of person."

No, you have to be radically inclusive. That's insane.

I need the help. But yeah, no.

Exactly. No. Come work on my piece and then you're radically inclusive. In being radically inclusive, you're allowing that other person to radically express themselves. And you're being radically expressive because your art piece is being made. Everyone is learning new skills which makes you more radically self-reliant.

All of it is a gift. All of it is in service of the project. It's about the journey and you have to decommodify that gift.

You have to keep that gift pure. If you start adding

Well, money cheapens it. Yeah.

Yeah. Money cheapens it. Which is really interesting because money has this value and yet when you add it, it cheapens it. So if you're going to keep that gift, pure you need to decommodify it. Now Larry always said decommodification doesn't mean you can't make money. Decommodification means remove the commodification

thatification interaction value.

Yeah.

Yeah. Exactly. The sponsorships like just because you know some big brand gives you a lot of money you don't put their logo on it. That's not Yeah,

you know, the tennis shoes built by brand A and the tennis shoes built by brand B are made in the same factory, but this one is $300 and this one is $30.

And the $300 one is because it has the brand logo on it.

And the $30 one is just sold at the big box store,

but yet they're the exact same shoe.

Exactly. Exactly.

And this one, the $300 one, is commodified.

Yeah. And so that's decommodification. But artists need to put food on the table. They need to sell their art. They need

I think that's the frequent mistake like some people make is that they think like decommodification is somehow akin to like communism or something which is like or or just like, you know, it's like anti- capitalism, you know? It's like money just shouldn't be involved at all for anything. Everything should be free. And it's like well no, I mean like I mean I mean running events, you have to have insurance and you have to have a bank account and you have to to incorporate and like you have to have, you know, money and like or like the BR the B uh uh BRC VR, you know, like or the burner sphere. It's like you're going to have to have some sort of subscription or or membership or camp dues or whatever you're going to call it because like there is money to to host the servers and to to to pay the people to to program and to to debug it like but you know, you're not you're not like a a hedge fund like your goal is not just like how much money can I extract from these people, you know, it's just like okay, what is the minimum necessary in order for it to do it. But like it it it is the lubrication that makes it work. You know, it's like it can't just be free. But then like you're saying like uh between like human interactions, you know, it's like I'll be your friend, but that's going to cost you $5. It's like we decommodify our our interactions, you know, and we try to remove money as much as possible, but like money is necessary, you know.

It is necessary. I mean, until we get to a system where we can utilize our social capital in that way then um you know we had a system

way back in human history that worked on social capital.

Oh yeah.

But we don't have that now.

Yeah.

And we're tied into this fiat currency and that paper is actually quite worthless. We just all believe that it has value and therefore it does. Yeah.

Um crypto works the same way. We all believe that it has that value and therefore it does. And but if you took all that away, all these incredibly wealthy people would be screwed.

Oh yeah.

And they don't actually have friends they can count on.

And when push comes to shove in a natural disaster or a war zone, you need friends you can count on.

Oh yeah. Oh yeah. Yeah. That's true.

So that's why communal efforts my favorite.

Yeah. Yeah. I don't know. I I I'm actually kind of like writing this essay. I think that the title is like community is is the true gift of of Burning Man and because I don't know for for many years like that's what I've always kind of gotten out of and even just doing the show it's like the most common thread I find between like everybody when I ask them like oh how Bernie man's you know impacted your life it's always comes back to some sort of like like community connection you know like yeah uh all right well

I mean I met my I I I met met my um now ex-husband, but I met him at Burning Man

and we had an entire Burning Man relationship through a band um that we were both part of and then a circus troop that we were both part of Mutator and then Cir Berserk and um and you know then we as a lot of relationships at Burning Man did we had a fiery explosion and no longer we're together. We're back to being friends again but it's

you know it's Burning Man is like a life cycle where you like I grew up

through Burning Man. I took my mom to Burning Man in 2014 and it was my 13th burn. I called it my Bach Mitzvah burn because I took my mom,

you know, like how how do we grow through Burning Man? How do progress in our life cycle

through this community? And

yeah, I got to

All my friends are burners.

Show you my Well, my t-shirt I'm wearing.

Yes. graduated. Oh, I love that.

Well, because last year I was like I was like I was like, "Okay, I'm an alumni regional contact from Hawaii. Started the Hawaii regional years ago and then retired and it was like there's a number of us." And I was like, "There's a lot of alumni out there." It's like,

"Well, where's the alumni reunion?" So, so I did this like little like tiny little alumni reunion at center camp. It was just like like two people showed up other than me. But I made these t-shirts like, "Hey, give them out to people, whatever." But I mean, I want a graduated shirt, although I didn't graduate. Actually, now I'm I'm like professor.

Well, yeah, exactly. I mean, it's kind of like you got your degree and now you're, you know, you're you're teaching a graduate course.

I definitely graduated.

But, I mean, some people look at it as kind of a negative thing. It's like, oh, you're just giving up on Burning Man. It's like, no, no, no. It's just like I I I went through the whole process. I learned all these things and now it's like I can take these things and I can like, you know, teach other people, you know?

Yeah. I'm an emmeritus. Exactly. Exactly. So that leads me to one final question. Something uh when I was camped at this year, your name was brought up and and they were talking about BRC VR and then people were I don't know having a debate and they were talking about just a what is a burner, right? And I remember one person was just was like, "Oh, you you know you you can't be a burn if you only experience it like in virtual reality. You're not really a burner." And I was like, "Well, you know, these are human connections and interactions. But I just wanted to like, you know, get your take on that like and what's what's your response to the person say just like you're not if you've never been to an actual regional event or if you've never been to like a physical like the Black Rock City but you've only experienced Burning Man in VR, it's like are you really a burner?

Oh yes, that is an inclusion question.

And and to say that makes the person who said it not a burner. Mhm.

M because you're not being radically inclusive. I believe that if you So the principles were not written as a you should do these things. The principles were merely written as a description of what we were already doing.

Exactly.

It was a response to people like myself, not that Dave in New York, George Pap in Austin. We were all doing events. We're all pulling permits and we have to write on the permit who the burners are and and why we should get a permit and So Larry to answer the question of who are we wrote a description 492 words and he was not known for brevity. So this is like a brief description of what it means to burn and who all the who are the burners. So if you're embodying all 10 and some regions have 11 and some regions have 12 but if you're embodying all of those then you're a burner. And maybe you've never been to a regional event before. We've all met somebody that has never been to Burning Man

that you're like, "Oh, yeah. You're totally a burn. Oh, yeah. You just haven't gone yet."

Exactly.

Right. So, you don't have to go to the big burn. You don't have to go to a regional event. But if you embody these principles, if you're just like a good humane being and that you practice communal effort, that you're participatory, you know, and that that you're radically self-reliant and that you love gifting of yourself, like if you do all those things. You're leaving no trace that you stand firm to your civic responsibility.

You're a burner.

Oh yeah.

And if you're actively doing and all of the principles are states of doing, not being, but doing, they're actions. There's leaving no trace, not leave no trace.

So if you're doing all of this stuff, then that's what it means to burn.

Yeah, that's beautiful. And perhaps uh burner sphere can uh You know, like we were saying, it's like, oh, perhaps somewhere around a million people who have actually been to some physical event, but how many other millions of people out there, like we're saying, it's like could be it's like you could be a Brit burner already.

You you might already be a member. There's a there's an opening line that Raspa gives in our introductory video and he says, "Welcome. You may already be a member because you are if you're here, if you're a burner and if you're burner cur serious

burner sphere is for you. It will not only it's a documentary, so it will not only help you understand and learn about the various communities of Burning Man and Burning Man itself, but it will also connect you to them

because if you're burner curious, it means that you have a flame in your heart and that flame, that passion has led you here because you're looking for that sense of belonging. You're looking for your community. And we're so diverse. We all, you know, follow around those same principles, but then we're completely diverse from Thunderdome to Pink Cart to Unicorns to Mayan Warrior. Like it is

everything that you can imagine. And if it doesn't exist, you now have permission to create it.

That's an opportunity for you. Yeah.

Yeah. That's an opportunity. So I actually this past year, uh, one of my campmates came back and he was so excited and tired but excited. I was like, "Oh, what did you do all day?" He sat and played D and D all day with a bunch of burners and I'm like

like people just

of course there's a D and D camp.

Oh yeah, of course

there is. And um so you know everything is possible and uh everyone is welcome and you might already be a member.

Wow, that's beautiful. Well, we've been going let's see about almost hour in 10 minutes. Well, thank you so much, Athena. This has been been awesome. Awesome. So, again, for the listeners, I'll put this in the show notes, but burnersphere.com if you're curious. You can go there and like check it out. And uh what' you say in uh June you're going to have your launch, but uh in like May you're going to have your alpha launch, right?

So, yeah. I mean, I'm going to start inviting in our alphas and then in June we are going to open it up to the public.

Um hopefully

and uh we want to coincide it with the Desert Arts preview. Fingers crossed we can make that happen, but it might be shortly thereafter. But that's our that's our goal.

And uh and it's a lofty one.

And uh yeah, and if anybody is interested in getting involved in the Burner Sphere project, maybe you're a technologist uh work as a uh in development um modelers. Uh who else do we can we use people for uh social media and marketing. If you if you're an investor and you want to get involved, these are all avenues and ways in which you can be part of the communal effort that is Burnersphere.

And how can they reach you if they're interested?

They can reach us at the burners.com website.

Okay. So, there's contact information. Okay.

Yeah, there's a contact form and it goes directly to my inbox.

All right. Excellent. Well, thank you very much. This has been illuminating. This has been wonderful and I I'm going to check out burnersfear.com for sure.

Yeah, please do. Do you have a headset?

Uh, not yet. But I'll have to get I'll have to get one.

We'll have to get one.

All right. Well, thank you very much. 

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