When I attended burning-man last year I was particularily impressed by the level of organization. One aspect in particular, being myself a fairly messy person, is that everyone cleans up after themselves, and to a surprisingly high standard, and while still having a good time. If this is possible, what else is?

That this is the case is interesting. But how did it come to be? I recently started digging into how this culture developed... and was surprised how little information there was.

The wikipedia page for MOOP only says

"Matter Out Of Place", a neologism for trash used by Burning Man attendees

On of the most interesting pieces I found was an account about the 2010 clean up of black rock city by Ranger Kidwell-Ross. This was published on http://www.worldsweeper.com/ a website about the street sweeping industry.

Because Burning Man is known as the most successful cleanup and restoration of any United States' event monitored by the U.S. Bureau of Land Management (BLM), I have long had a professional interest in seeing how it's done in person. You see, not only are 50,000+ people camped for a week with no food or other items being bought or sold; even more astonishing, no trash disposal whatsoever is provided or available.

As a sweeping professional, Kidwell-Ross is very curious about the requirements of the clean up process:

Although zero debris left behind by all is the goal, that is, of course, not actually 100% attainable. I set out to find out if there was an established benchmark of allowable debris an annual theme camp was allowed to leave and still pass inspection. What I learned during my investigation was astonishing: The debris left behind per acre by any of the many theme camps could not exceed what would fit onto a 9-inch paper plate!

If those exacting standards are not met by one of the annual camps, that camp's organizers are required to come back and re-clean in order to get their camping permit for the next year. Oh, and half of the material on the plate has to be wood or paper, not glass, metal, plastic or other material.

in his article, Kidwell-Ross is described as the world's most prolific author on the topic of power sweeping.

This article also introduces a key lead to my story, the earth guardians:

The Earth Guardians group was formed in 1997 to inspire the evolving Burning Man community to embrace Leave No Trace (LNT) principles and practices. However, Bruman explained that the group really came into its own after the 1998 Burning Man when rain delayed the cleanup by creating a huge MOOP mess that proved challenging to remove with the then-current methods being used.

But the earth guardians are just a burning man attached offshoot of the leave no trace organization an enviromental movement known for their slogal "take only photos, leave only footprints". in their video is says they were founded in 1998.

fun fact: 1997 was also the first year with a trash fence and also with a ban on guns.

Statistically, the results of the cleanup are astounding: In 1991, representatives of the Bureau of Land Management (BLM) first inspected the playa. Even though it was only a week after completion of the burn, they found no traces of the art that was burned or even where the campsite itself had been. This track record of environmental stewardship has continued ever since, leading the BLM in 2003 to declare Burning Man to be "the largest Leave No Trace event in the world."

Hmm, should be able to find a citation for this.

Kidwell-Ross describes in some detail how the cleanup process happens. Teams organized with military precision use form lines (standing about 6 feet apart) and go over everything, called a "line sweep". They mark "hotspots" which another team comes by and does more thougherly.

I haven't yet found anything on when this practice started, but since 2006 they have been producing a "moop map" a colour coded map of what camps left how much moop.
there is a moopmap website but it's a blogspot that hasn't been updated since 2012. All the posts are by "D.A.", who is also audio interviewed at the end of the worldsweeper article. Dominic "D.A." Tinio is Playa Restoration Manager. In this video he says he's been going to burning man since 1997. in the 2011 interview he says "moop was coined a long time ago".

How long ago was it coined?

also note: on wednesday the moop camp does a "pub crawl" where they do a line sweep along Esplanade, and stop at every bar along the way. as mentioned in DA's video. Oh and right after that: the colours on the moop map represent speed, how long it takes them to pick up everything.
This video contradicts the worldsweeping article - it's 1 sq foot of moop per acre.

Other notes:

The Burning Man wikipedia page spends a lot of bytes describing trivia such as how tall the man was each year, where as I am mostly interested in how it's organized, and how it evolved.

Indeed, the "Principles of Burning Man" were created in 2004, intended as guide lines for regional events.

Reading the wikipedia page, you could get the impression that the structure at BM was a response to a push from state requirements. So there is this ongoing tension between legibility and chaos. Although, a few places it mentions rules being introduced simply for safety.

The "trash fence" (a 1.2 meter high 14.8 km long fence) was added in 1997.

ha, here is a find!

Am reading this journal of someone who participated in the cleanup, and there is one page that documents a BLM inspection

this photo

Is captioned "Mr. Klean and our BLM buddy Mike Bilbo walk the sample sector with ziplocks in hand."

Hang on, isn't there a mike bilbo in the earth guardians video?. The BLM and other state orgs are usually presented as an external other from the perspective of burning man, but here clearly we see the boundry is permeable. Working for the BLM seems like an acceptable day job for an enviromentalist. I wonder what other government positions would be a tolerable career for burners?

One aspect in particular, being myself a fairly messy person, is that everyone cleans up after themselves, and to a surprisingly high standard, and while still having a good time. If this is possible, what else is?

@Dominic Leave this world in a better condition than you found it, as best to your ability. I really wish more people would accept this as a fundamental truth.

Indeed, but actually delivering that is not as straightforward.

But there are some cases were it's a lot more rewarding. Such as at your hackerspace when you can easily find all the tools because they are in the same place they always are.