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