New Burning Man camps by neural network

Burning Man descends every year on a patch of Nevada desert, turning it into a giant, strange maze of art projects and themed camps. At various camps you may find tea, techno, giant animatronic owls, beans, banjos, giant ambulatory anglerfish, new pants, snow cones, or, eventually, giant flaming things. Each year the art projects are invited to celebrate a particular theme.

This year’s theme? Artificial intelligence.

So of course, I had to see what kind of camps a neural network might invent. Thanks to an anonymous burner, I had a list of 1593 past Burning Man camps to feed to a neural network. A neural network is a kind of machine learning algorithm that learns to imitate the data it sees. My starting point was a textgen-rnn neural net that had been previously trained on metal bands and roller derby names, so it had a few ideas of its own to bring to the table. It did not disappoint.

Here’s one set of names it generated. With these, at least you know what they are. The concept’s in the name. These are all pretty safe-sounding, except for maybe the cholla one.

Commotion Camp

Knit Camp

Camp Cookies

Art Lighting

Free Jet

Camp Monster

Echo Storm

Astro Sparkin

Francy Camp

Corners

No Flash

Burper Camp

Sparkli’s Serpent

Bar -be in Cholla

These are a bit more ambiguous. You might not know what to expect, but you would probably know when you arrived.

Camp Bumps

Bear Swing

Sea Destruction

Camp Secret Buff

Spankles

Fight Gift

Birdbland

Shadow Hunk

Lady Camp X Ma Space

Camp Star Sparkle Bar

Little Camp Child Coffee

Space Rock Screamin Camp

Station Hoop

Rock Bonkness

The Playahorse

Punchopun

Free Corns of Camp

The Crime Swang

Dirty Chris

Spade Bears

With THESE, um. I don’t know what you’re going to find, but it’s going to be interesting.



Burpy Lander

Boo Down Whiskers

Lump Make Toast

Mauli Honey Ski

Camp Dangerage Unicore

Wiq Renames Spaghette

Bret Camp Wolf Washer

Corn Viral Hammers

Stellarical Whisket Hooks

Murder Bull of Camp Kissuost

Sugar Rock Thump

Hellball Lounge

These camps are probably going to be the sort they call “unforgettable.” The kind you’ll never, ever be able to explain.

Flying Reckle

Woody Squaggins

Wheelsfitchers

Cohnie Stacefur Ass Chaos

Awes Orpoop

Preletive Suckers

Evil Slup a Cirly Clup

Gloundertuse Chew!

Sir Liberains the Wreck Middle

Bo Frost Cat of Star Majorpreways

There was, as you might expect if you’ve got any experience with Burning Man camps, another category of camp whose themes are a bit more “Adult”. You know, Paying Bills, Voting, Cleaning Up Cat Vomit, that sort of thing? Enter your email here to get these bonus names (and, if you want, bonus material each time I post a new blog entry).