Toxic BBQ

15:00- 21:00 August 8, Thursday   Sunset Park, Foxtail Pavilion ( 36.0636, -115.1178 ) Another Toxic in the books. Our 8th and the 18th overall. 2024 Stats: 800 hackers 700 burgers 500 hot dogs 50 non-meat patties 50 cases of bottled water and countless conversations over smoked salmon, pork shoulder, homebrew, mead, and cheeses Thanks to your generosity,  we covered costs and raised over $1000 for the EFF. Uncounted is the time volunteers spent grilling, prepping, and cleaning up. We can’t wait to meat you all next year. Here’s the rest of the invite page for posterity:   The humans of Vegas invite you to this year’s unofficial welcome party. Join us off-Strip in the shade of Sunset Park for a heat-blasted hangout. Burgers, dogs, and meatless options are provided. Attendees pitch in to make everything else happen. Contribute more food and drinks, staff the grill, join supply runs, or donate cash to help cover costs. Relax under the trees and converse with new and old fri...

 For off-season fundraising, we're trying Zazzle. Check out merch and get stickers all by yourself! https://www.zazzle.com/store/toxic_bbq Shirts, hats, mugs and stickers to slake your thirst as you wait and pine for the heat of the grill. We get a tiny cut to help us keep the BBQ running smoothly.

Thank you for making this trial run a success! 40 shirts and a bunch of money helped us cover the venue before the event itself!   Buy a T-shirt to Support Toxic BBQ! We need your help to feed 800 hungry-hungry hackers. For the first time in a while, we are holding a pre-cookout fundraiser. Get a shirt with The Toxic Zone logo featuring Rod Serloin himself, and help us cover venue, food, and equipment costs. Purchasing a shirt through this fundraiser will help us cover the costs of the barbecue and cover your body from the harsh desert sun. Both of these things will ensure that everyone has a great time. The fundraiser runs for one month to make sure it ships in time for the con. Pickup is also available. A shirt isn’t the only way to support Toxic BBQ. Here are some ways you can get involved: Donate food or funds: Every little bit helps! You can purchase food during the Supply Run or donate at the event. Volunteer: teams of volunteers help with setup, cleanup, and staffing the gr...

   Toxic BBQ Unofficial DEF CON Kick-off Cookout 15:00- 21:00 August 10, Thursday   Sunset Park Pavilion F ( 36.0636, -115.1178 )   WAS AWESOME! We had:   600 Hackers 600 Burgers 400 Hotdogs 98 Degrees 10 Racks of Ribs 2 Briskets 2 Gallons of Sauce and Several Smokin’ Hot Butts Photo Goon AJ702 provided some great shots   The announcement is preserved here for posterity: The humans of Vegas invite you to this year’s unofficial welcome party. Join us off-Strip in the shade of Sunset Park for a heat-blasted hangout. Burgers, dogs, and meatless options are provided.  Attendees pitch in to make everything else happen. Contribute more food and drinks, staff the grill or join supply runs, and relax under the trees with good conversation with new and old friends.  Be a part of what makes this cookout something to remember year after year.  Grab flyers from an Info Booth , and watch for #ToxicBBQ for the latest news. Important Times: 1PM -  Sup...

For the first time in a long while, Toxic BBQ was interrupted by rain.  Thankfully, the skies waited to fall until 9PM, but that made our egress even more difficult than normal. With the help of many soaked hackers, we got the pavilion clean and clear, and everyone back to their hotels. In a first, we did a pretty good job of collecting volunteer information! If we missed you, and you'd like to help organize next year, please reach out on the socials to get in on this. Thanks for helping us make it happen, year after year.  Feels like home. - DuncanYoudaho and the_bozo Innovations: -  Assorted grilled veggies and engineered meat - Countless mouths burned once again thanks to Peppercon - An assortment of strange jerky -  A whole-ass pork butt Stats: 800 Hackers fed  600 Burgers and dogs 10lbs pulled pork 98 degrees 1 Biblical Flood Pics:

Regional caravans are part of conference traditions, and the trip can be an adventure in itself. This history of Hackbus originally appeared in the Toxic BBQ History Zine . PacBell was the first hacker In could find that drove a city bus from Oregon to Vegas in the early days of DEF CON. EvilMoFo and Fpenguin followed suit in 2007. The HackBus was a 1956 GM PD 4104 bus delivered to Public Service Coordinated Transport in New Jersey. A quick vacuum and some old couches allowed it to make the trip from San Fran to DC15, but it didn’t return home until October. A laundry list of repairs, including a new engine, kept it on the road year after year. Those who rode it to DEF CON said it was one of the most entertaining, if sweaty, ways to get there. Bay Area hackers worked on it together to add amenities like 16G internet (4 carriers x 4G each!), pirate radio stations, and sometimes-functional AC. In addition to the road trip to DC, the HackBus ferried legions to Toxic BBQ, and it also resc...

For 2021’s Toxic BBQ, I reached out to a number of organizers within the hacker community for stories and advice on staging your own event within an event . Sc0tland told me about an incident that stood out as a good pattern for how to deal with disruptive elements at community events. An issue at BSidesDFW 2021 and its aftermath reminded me of this, so I tracked down someone who was there for a first-person account, metlstorm , “theme/art-director/webs/MC” for Kiwicon itself. Kiwicon was a hacker conference run 2007-2018 by a small group of friends that got together in the early 2000’s scene in New Zealand. Eleven cons in twelve years were marked by growth of the organizers as individuals and the scene as a whole. Looking back, they had a rocky start with aggressive themes: Kiwicon 1 artwork included Goatse, and the second rendition was “Kiwicon 2girls1cup”. As metlstorm put it, “We tried pretty hard over the years to get it right, and i think one of the overlooked bits of our story...