Technology continues to be an integral and strategic part of our year-round and event operations. Just about every member of our staff and community relies on several of our technology systems to do their jobs or connect with us and with each other. During our Tech Committee series in early 2012, we took a collective pause of appreciation when we realized that there were 147 projects listed on our “Monster Gantt Chart”, and more projects on the way.
A team of dedicated staff and volunteers continue to support the Burning Man website, slowly upgrading previously static pages to be dynamic pages to which content owners can publish their own updates. In addition, the Web Team rolled outspark.burningman.com a new tool that helps our community match needs and resources to support projects for Black Rock City and year-round community activities.
Our Operations Team continues to provide excellent network connectivity, desktop support and system administration. Faced with a growing staff in our Headquarters and increasing complexity in our playa operations, there are always numerous staff and volunteers working diligently behind-the-scenes to make sure the rest of us can get our work done without interruption.
Many of the new projects added to our list were in support of our emerging 501c3 non-profit organization, the Burning Man Project. When the organization received official notice of its 501c3 status, we got busy setting up basic donation, volunteer, email and newsletter systems. Many lessons have been learned from the organic growth and scrappy homegrown team systems that served Black Rock City, LLC for many years, so we are investing in our collective future and supporting the non-profit using best-in-class software solutions. This approach will help us better manage our relationships with our growing community, set the stage for growing the non-profit operations, and allow us to spend less time tinkering with operational systems while we develop more strategic opportunities with other members of our technical community.