Spring / The island
Futureproof Island Retreat
Planned May 3–6, 2027
Camp Denman · Denman Island, BC
Room for the unfinished.
Step out of the feed. Bring a difficult question, a creative experiment, and a little room to change your mind.
2027 is openIsland Retreat + Festival of AI
Futureproof Festival of AI
An international AI culture and ideas festival
Thank you, Vancouver.That was year one.
Futureproof Festival 2026 is officially sold out. First year. Thank you. Three days of questions, creativity and people showing up for each other. Explore the photographs, revisit the conversations and see what comes next.
Vancouver · October 28–30, 2026H.R. MacMillan Space Centre
2026 attendee guide →2026 edition · Opening night + two program days · 36 speakers
On stage at Futureproof Festival
October 28, 2026 · Opening night
You had to be there. Here’s a little of it.
Photos: Michelle Diamond. Diamond’s Edge Photography.
The next chapter / 2027
Keep the good
questions going.
From the island to the city. Two ways to keep making, questioning and finding your people. Check each gathering’s registration details for current availability.
Fall / The city
Futureproof Festival of AI
Planned October 25–29, 2027
Vancouver, BC · Venue to come
Bring your questions.
Artists, researchers, builders and communities. Five planned days to make things, challenge assumptions and shape what comes next.
Dates are planned. Detailed programs, contributors and travel arrangements are still taking shape. Review the current ticket details and terms on Luma.
Our community partners
We don't do this alone.
Research labs, data communities, filmmakers and the places that bring us together. These partners help make Futureproof Festival happen.
Data for Good Vancouver
Vancouver's volunteer data science community.
DAMA-Vancouver
Data governance and stewardship.
SFU Metacreation Lab
Machine creativity, generative art and live performance.
BC + AI Film Club
Films that make us question AI.
Multimodal Media Lab
AI filmmaking and multimodal storytelling.
CreativeMornings Vancouver
Vancouver's monthly creative breakfast.
H.R. MacMillan Space Centre
Our festival home in Vanier Park.
Ethọ́s Lab
Youth, creativity and STEAM education.
Friends Quarters
A home for Vancouver's independent creatives.
Sons of Vancouver
Independent spirits from North Vancouver.
Rival Technologies
Conversational research and human insight.
DevITJobs
Tech careers with salary transparency.
Tradeswomen Exhibit
Carly Steiman's celebration of women in skilled trades.
ISACA Vancouver Chapter
Vancouver's chapter for digital trust and cybersecurity professionals.
Friday · October 30 · 9:30–10:30 AM
A FanTrust Conversation with Naomi Klein
Join us for an intimate conversation with international bestselling author and climate justice advocate Naomi Klein. FanTrust President Catherine Warren sits down with Naomi to discuss her worldview and new book, End Times Fascism: And the Fight for the Living World, co-written with Astra Taylor. Oligarchs, tech bros, and populist politicians may look like strange bedfellows, but they share an AI ethos and a common toolkit. Together, we’ll unbox it. From harrowing to hopeful, hear how Naomi’s work traces systems of power, who profits from them, and where the rest of us can still push back.
View this session in the program →On stage
All 36 speakers →Learn from the people doing the work.
The program
Three days with a shape.
Opening night sets the questions. Thursday gets into the systems and decisions. Friday brings cultural policy, language reclamation, creative work and the closing keynote. Start with a session that matters to you.
Wednesday · October 28
Amber Case, Brewster Kahle, a live set, and a party
- Calm Technology in the Age of Loud Machines
Amber Case
- What a Library Owes the People Who Aren't Born Yet
Brewster Kahle
- Opening-Night Creative AI Live Set
Philippe Pasquier
Thursday · October 29
Making sense of it together
- Consciousness, Agency, and Building It Anyway
Loki Jorgenson
- Who Owns the Infrastructure Underneath All This
Sev Geraskin
- What the country decides
Taleeb Noormohamed + Kris Krüg
Friday · October 30
What we build next, then the closing party
- A FanTrust Conversation with Naomi Klein
Naomi Klein + Catherine Warren
- AI, creativity and cultural policy
Ana Serrano + Prem Gill
- There is No "I" in AI
Ben Shneiderman
Full program
Updated October 31, 2026 · published 2026 program
Festival home
We picked a planetarium on purpose.
A planetarium in Vanier Park, built for scientific curiosity. Vancouver AI has been gathering here for years. Futureproof Festival brought three days of research, creative practice and questions about our shared future to this place.
1100 Chestnut St, Vancouver, BC V6J 3J9·Festival home base: opening night + two program days
Start with your work
Take the questions back to your work.
Who owns the infrastructure? Who controls the data? What should stay a human responsibility? Explore the program, revisit the questions and connect them to the work in front of you.
Six questions running through the program
Community
Compare approaches across professions. Learn how other people are responding to AI in their organizations, institutions and communities.
Creativity
Examine authorship and craft through generative music, animation and film. See how creative practitioners decide where AI belongs in their work.
Ethics
Ask who owns the models and data, who benefits, and who bears the consequences. Connect AI governance to decisions you can actually make.
Resilience
Explore what AI means for institutions, knowledge and the planet. Consider which systems need to endure as the technology changes.
Education
Build the understanding to evaluate AI claims, ask better questions and help others make informed choices. Examine the assumptions beneath machine intelligence.
Empowerment
Understand where human agency belongs in AI systems. Bring that perspective to what you build, buy, commission, teach or govern.
The experience behind the festival
Challenging ideas. Useful connections.
Futureproof Festival grows out of Vancouver AI and BC + AI. These are reflections on earlier meetups, BC + AI courses and guest teaching, with the original context credited below each quote.
“… I was probably more impressed by the speakers who disturbed me than the ones I agreed with. This conversation is so important, and yet too limited in our everyday lives. …”
Gus SantosVancouver AI Meetup #10 · October 2024
“Two things can be true at once. AI is here and I'm going to keep enabling it across our teams. And it can be done responsibly, with humans first, by people who treat that as the actual job rather than a disclaimer at the bottom of a deck.”
“Kris helped shift how my design students see their future. In one hour, he demo'd building client prototypes in real-time, turned lectures into podcasts, and showed them how to be design orchestrators, not pixel pushers.”
“The course delivers very important insights into risks of large scale AI deployments. … Highly recommended for anyone who has a stake in the responsible use of PII data, environmental impact, and good governance of AI projects.”
Fiann O'HaganWeb analytics and performance · Responsible AI Professional, Cohort 1
Read eight more perspectives from the community
“FWIW, the BC + AI Ecosystem, of which I'm a member, is different than any other AI group I'm aware of — full of artists and creatives, filmmakers and indigenous voices, as well as deep tech experts and entrepreneurs. It holds space for both wonder and scepticism around AI without veering too far one way or the other.”
“… The interactive format and tight-knit atmosphere fostered real connections—and I even lucked into meeting the perfect collaborator for my AI project.”
Jesse BensonVancouver AI Meetup #19 · July 2025
“I am stumped. I arrive in Vancouver and stumble upon this strange and colourful community that has done more for my BC network than any conference. …”
“Something is happening here. The energetic dialogue at these events is hard to describe. It feels like we are witnessing the creation of something special, here in Vancouver, as the whole world figures out how to embrace AI.”
“Kris Krüg has built something important for our community.”
“The opening grounding … made the rest of the night feel that before anyone says 'agentic workflow,' remember whose land, whose water, whose stories, whose labour, and whose data we are standing on. … Rock on, Mr KK!”
Suzy EastonVancouver AI Meetup #30
“I went to my first Vancouver AI community meetup event last month and it was buzzing with energy… Truly inspired.”
“So pleased to have completed this course, the guidance was amazing, and the final capstone was a chance to explore responsible AI. If you want to round out your understanding of ethics, and responsible AI, this is well worth the time.”
David Gloyn-CoxEnterprise Architect · Responsible AI Professional, Cohort 1
Latest from the festival
News from the festival.
Stories, photographs and ideas from the festival community.
Thank you, Futureproof Festival 2026
The conversations carry on.
To our speakers, artists, volunteers, partners and everyone who joined us: thank you for making space for serious questions and unexpected connections.
Stay in the conversation.
Festival highlights, photographs and news about what comes next.
Not the Future Proof you were looking for? There is a U.S. wealth-management conference with a similar name. This one is the Vancouver AI festival. More in the FAQ
