2018 BRC Census deadline extended and some preliminary results

[Picky]

Hey everyone - it's that time of year again! If you haven't done so already, take a few minutes to fill out your Census at https://www.surveygizmo.com/s3/4417462/ ... ity-Census.

Also, we just posted a few highlights of the random sample data, with final results to come around the usual time next year (Jan/Feb). The TL;DR version - 2018 saw fewer virgins, more people from Nevada, and more people who reported their tickets were a gift, compared to previous years. Read more at https://journal.burningman.org/2018/10/ ... -extended/

In case you've forgotten the drill - Census is in three parts, from most critical to most fun: 1) demographics, 2) event/logistics, 3) outside researchers' questions about all the fun parts of being a BRC citizen. If you don't have time to do it all, do what you can and hit the save button. Some data are better than no data!

[some seeing eye]

Yes.

The census is a public tool to understand big burning man. A lot of our discussion on improving the event would benefit from a close read!

The BORG has a lot of proprietary ticket data. Presumably they are thinking about it.

But the big news is the decline in percentage for 2 years of virgins. Future virgins, don't be butthurt. Get involved in your regional in person to connect to the secondary market. We want virgins who return year over year, are involved with their regional, and bring art!

If you want to improve something, you have to measure it - the baseline, and subsequent.

Census does. Well.

Hope there is a proprietary why census of the non-returning burner profiles.

[Token]

SSE,

Can you translate that into simple English?

2 year Virgins? What is that?

I’m confused about your excitement.

[Ratty]

For the last 2 years there has been a decline in virgins.

[some seeing eye]

I strongly support the original intent of this thread. Do the 2018 Census online!

I read the detailed public census end to end every year. It is a critical gift. It informs my ideas and my comments on eplaya.

The census has non-public detail, not because it's deliberately secret. Much of the cross-correlation data is too complex to present.

The BORG has proprietary burner profile, ticket registration, ticket sales, individual-level entry and some camp-level data.

In the public census 9x% virgins say they will return, but that does not happen. Why?

One would expect the BORG seriously analyzes all of it ongoing.

Census is not the emergency services department, they are the future vision data department.

[Picky]

But the big news is the decline in percentage for 2 years of virgins. Future virgins, don't be butthurt. Get involved in your regional in person to connect to the secondary market. We want virgins who return year over year, are involved with their regional, and bring art!

I suppose it depends on what you think of as meaningful change. Yes, the decrease in the percentage of virgin burners in 2017 and 2018 is statistically significant, but is a change of 2 percentage points (2016 to 2017) really meaningful? The decrease from 2017 to 2018 is slightly larger than that, sure, but again - these are preliminary data. It's an interesting trend, but I'd be wary of overselling it until we see the final data.

Another interesting trend to your point (one I didn't put in the blog post linked above) is that BRC had an increase in longtime Burners this year. In 2017, 4.8% (+-0.4) of Burners had attended 11 or more previous burns; in 2018, preliminary data show ~7% (+-1.1) of Burners in 2018 had attended 11 or more previous burns. Will be interesting to see what the final data show on these points...

Hope there is a proprietary why census of the non-returning burner profiles.

If there is any data collected from Burner profiles, it's not done by the BRC Census. The random-sample part of the Census is voluntary and confidential; the online survey is voluntary and anonymous. We don't collect any personally identifiable information, and participation in the online Census is not linked in any way to your Burner profile (which, of course, does have PII).

The census has non-public detail, not because it's deliberately secret. Much of the cross-correlation data is too complex to present.

Each year's population analysis report has a visualization for every question the Census asks. Nothing secret. And we always welcome people to the fold who want to do interesting analysis with the Census data. Feel free to reach out if you have ideas of correlations or relationships you want to test and write about.

[Picky]

And of course I forgot to say, SSE - thanks for appreciating the work we do at Census!

[Bergerac]

Thanks for the link picky.